


Live Forever, or Die Trying

by King of Novices (mykonos)



Category: Assassin's Creed
Genre: Action/Adventure, Age Difference, Alternate Universe - Mythology, Dubious Consent, F/F, F/M, From hate to love, Hurt/Comfort, Implied/Referenced Torture, M/M, Non-sexualized nudity, Sexual Content, Slow Build, Unresolved Sexual Tension, Violence, long story, transsexual character, younger Malik
Language: English
Status: In-Progress
Published: 2014-11-11
Updated: 2017-02-16
Packaged: 2018-02-24 23:45:53
Rating: Explicit
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 15
Words: 212,627
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/2600771
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/mykonos/pseuds/King%20of%20Novices
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>When Altaïr left for war, he left a young husband behind. Seven years after, Altaïr is returning home and hoping to find his husband as loyal as he once promised to remain. Altaïr finds Malik changed and his city changing. Things are not as he had left them, ancient prophecies are fulfilled, and gods are conspiring against gods.</p>
            </blockquote>





	1. Chapter 1

**Author's Note:**

> **Welcome!** Before you start you should know that in order to connect everything you will have to invest yourself in a bit, because there are nine gods (who aren't OCs but actually represent nine Assassin's Creed characters) coming into the story one by one. But worry not, it's not hard! **The setting of the story was created from the scratch and any similarities to other mythologies are coincidental.**
> 
> Most of the gods are drawn and I'll link you to drawings as the gods start appearing, so that you know how they look. **[Here is the entire masterpost for this story.](http://the-king-of-novices.tumblr.com/post/108753402976/live-forever-or-die-trying-masterpost) **
> 
> Take a quick look at [Altair's](http://the-king-of-novices.tumblr.com/post/106085998241/art-by-precious-mrasayf-altairs-warrior-armor) [armor](http://komakirin.tumblr.com/post/109416860277/i-have-been-planning-to-draw-picture-of-the-king) and [the city map](http://prezi.com/gip9vov8u-e1/?utm_campaign=share&utm_medium=copy&rc=ex0share) of this setting before you start reading (you can zoom in and move around, first pic is the entire island and the second is the inner city). 
> 
>  
> 
> **Welcome aboard, we're starting a long and exciting journey.**

Altaïr rules his body but cannot rule himself.

He advances up the narrow street ascending the hill which once was the cradle of humanity. The path he climbs with Desmond in his wake alternates between stair-steps and leveled blocks layered with glittering cobbles, strewn with petals and flowers.

A perfumey smell bursts from each entrance to community courtyards and wafts into the narrow street upsetting the fragile peace that has settled in his gut.

Altaïr smells the city.

Its streets and citizens, its spices and spirits. Nothing has changed. Nothing but those who left unchanged seven years ago.

Altaïr listens to eager shouts and hustle of life on the streets and they provide to him a steady reminder of what he had fought for. When he left, he brought with him many an expectation, and returned with a litter of scars. These he bears like trophies—his statements of allegiance to the cause that had led him away from home when duty and creed called for sacrifice. Here, away from the battlefield, song and laughter have swapped place with tears and blood.

This thought gives his agitated spirits a brief respite. It calms him to know that things are as he had left them seven years ago. Some of the passers-by recognize him as he strides up the steep path and he dips his head wordlessly and keeps his helmet imprinted into his flank, feels the weight of his sword against the other. The long tail of his helmet is an occasional brush against the bare portion of his thigh. He hasn’t combed his tail in nearly two days.

A handful of steps is what bars him from home and he falters in step.

A spike of anxiety breaches through the wall of self-deception and his breath quickens, for reasons other than the strenuous climb up the cobblestones of the path he knows like his own sword.

The city remains untouched by the arduous war fought far from its borders, but the state of his own home yet eludes him, remains an enigma. Altaïr remembers vividly what he had left before embarking on duty, but knows not what he will find at the end of his path.

“What if he’s grown skinny?“

Desmond taunts.

He slaps the back of his hand against Altaïr’s flank to staunch off a retaliation before Altaïr can misinterpret his intention, “What if he’s dead? Worse, what if he’s been letting other men between his legs—“

Altaïr stomps in place and sets his boot to pavement, turns to Desmond fiery-eyed with nostrils flared, and Desmond knows in an instant that Altaïr is terrified.

The years they have spent together as warriors have bestowed upon Desmond knowledge of Altaïr’s subtle facial expressions, and the way in which he utilizes each corner of his face to convey emotion, rare as it is. Altaïr flares his nostrils thus on two occasions only. The first one is a rarity (one Desmond still considers a myth) that only Ezio had witnessed—Ezio who relayed this delicate observation to him a long time ago. It’s a short flicker of a motion, a hard-to-catch twitch of nostrils that signals Altaïr’s stirring of sexual arousal. The second one, much familiar to Desmond, is this frozen flare of nostrils that flaunts Altaïr’s anger.

Altaïr is provoked by Desmond’s innocuous taunt. A way to displace good intention.

Desmond blames himself. Altaïr’s marital issues are a sore spot he shouldn’t have trampled upon.

“He’s not a whore. He’s not skinny.“ Altaïr falls into a whisper of a growl lest someone hears him, “And he can’t be dead,“ Altaïr hurries to assure himself before he assures Desmond, then resumes his path with a tightening of the burlap sack across his shoulder—a crude sack brimming with gold and other riches—his spoils from war. He shifts his shoulder and rolls it back into the sack to stifle the chink of coins.

“How long since you left him?“ Desmond nags with the question he already knows answer to.

Altaïr decides to indulge.

“Seven years, one month, two days.“

His boots feel heavy, his feet sore; his head swims with the prospect of what he will find in his house.

He scatters resolve and halts in mid-step. Desmond is victim to Altaïr’s fickle step and he doesn’t resume his path either, but a succession of furious laughter and yelling from some distance above make both warriors look up.

A stream of adolescent boys and girls dressed in short tunics and merry laughter spills down the cobbled street carrying garlands dipped in incense.

This merry group moves in rush but makes a stop to hang wreaths of flowers upon each warrior before they depart taking smiles and laughter with them. Desmond shuffles uneasily, trying to look disinterested, but his gaze is true to the girls descending down the path and their short, billowy tunics.

Altaïr feels some stray amusement stir at the sight.

He lets the sack of riches fall from his shoulder and shifts its weight into his other hand, then takes the garland off. He takes a whiff of flowery scents before he adds it to the one on Desmond’s neck, and gives a cursory push against Desmond’s bare chest.

“Go.“

Desmond smirks in response to this order while toying with the new wreath around his neck, “You mistake me for Ezio. I’m not the one visiting every other bed before visiting my own.“

“Then go home. You’ve more distance to cross.“ Altaïr dismisses him and picks the sack up onto his shoulder again as a tacit dismissal. Desmond puts his helmet on in silence and combs fingers through his tail after he does so, saluting once before taking off.

“I’ll see you at the appointed hour.“ With this, he leaves Altaïr to his own unwanted thoughts.

People live on this island as inhabitants, they live in this city-state as citizens, but most importantly, people live as members of their community. A trifle steps up and to the left is where Altaïr’s community is comfortably nestled.

To his right, set into the wall is a street niche hosting a statue of [Nokem](http://the-king-of-novices.tumblr.com/post/104486337526/live-forever-or-die-trying-the-pantheon-1-9) and a boy praying to this god of vengeance. Altaïr feels that he’s imposing himself on the sacred privacy of prayer by giving it notice, but the trickle of familiar crimson on the boy’s wrist wrestles his mind from graver thoughts and provides fleeting distraction. The boy is in the midst of sacrifice. Blood oozes from his cut wrist, trickles on while the boy seals off what is a blessing or curse through silent prayer.

The boy can’t be older than Malik.

When Altaïr left for duty, he (perhaps foolishly) left behind his newly-acquired home in the hands of Malik, a mere child when he was wed to Altaïr. But Altaïr had no one else.

The boy deserts the niche leaving Nokem to solitude and paying no heed to the warrior who had been observing.

From his sack Altaïr produces a coin and puts it to rest in the flat of his rough, dry palm. On the coin is the embossed image of Nokem slaying his enemy. It must be a will of the god.

Altaïr delves into the niche to leave the coin upon the pedestal of the statue, in the company of a handful others. His wish is as modest as his offering. Altaïr covets something easy on the eye to obey him untill the rest of his days. He wishes for Malik’s beauty. And his loyalty.

Nokem’s gaze is judging from beneath his stony hood, his eyes a heavy, stifling black, and Altaïr retreats to shy away from the weight of the god’s scrutiny.

No one is making to leave the community courtyard as Altaïr slips into the tunnel, and his presence is unnoticed. He hides behind the heavy folding of inert drapery at the end of the passage where to a halt come every move or thought. Altaïr peeks into the courtyard from this scanty cover to observe his commune.

Talk flutters around.

The inside opens into an oval courtyard ringed with shadowy benches where a knot of children is practicing the cithara in one spot, concealed by a curtain of hanging plants growing lush from pots fringing the first-story ledge.

On a massive table sits a tender woman, a babe suckling on her breast. Altaïr remembers her. He subconsciously recalls seeing her courted by one of the city guards, an austere and willful woman, he recalls being emphatically opposed to their marriage. Now they number more than Altaïr’s own family.

The notion propels him into widening his gaze and he turns his thought away from this mnemonic banality to seek out Malik. Beside the young mother, two men are salting meat and fish. Behind, a collection of elderly women, restless beings brimming with knowledge and in constant quest for tidings.

On the water well, two youths are washing clothes beneath the shade of [Daga](http://the-king-of-novices.tumblr.com/post/105887755561/live-forever-or-die-trying-the-pantheon-4-9)’s mermaid tails.

One of them a male, a fetching young man, well built, with the wire of slender muscle and bronze of skin most pleasing to the eye. This is not the boy of ten he had left behind and his heart quickens at such a vision.

A surprise beyond all surprises. Altaïr’s wish, though far from being dull, lacked the terrific vigor of this image.

Malik is on his knees, snug inside the curvature of the washing basin of the well, dragging a tawny-tinged piece of cloth through a shallow pool of water and soaking the fabric methodically. This cloth he wrings out and stows into a pail of wet clothes.

Everything on him appears healthy. He is pretty, less dramatically than gorgeous women, but easy on the eye.

Malik’s hands are for some obscure reason swathed into letharette gloves stopping short before elbows. With his inner elbow he wipes across the sheen of perspiration gathered on his forehead, pressing the damp black, _black_ , hair to sweaty skin. His eyes are as dark as Altaïr remembers them, and wild hair awry under the dimmed harshness of the sun. His once-soft face chiseled into the sharp features of a young adult. Altaïr’s husband stands a vision of Nokem himself.

Seven years after, Altaïr’s second impression of him is a breathless one. Finding his husband a domesticated creature and in good looks is thrusting his joy to unimaginable heights.

Seven years, one month, two days.

That long since he applied for a special dispensation to marry Malik, a child of ten falling to this agreement in order to evade certain death, with salty tracks fresh on plump cheeks and whispers of revenge upon lip. The child’s notion of obedience had been fantastically poor, but its sense of loyalty unrelenting.

Altaïr’s sack of spoils is a steady burden but he dares not move for fear of disturbing such vision and he keeps it on shoulder, holds steady as his thoughts soar to implied delights. To Malik’s lips, unsmiling but untouched—lips he shall have occasion to taste to full extent.

Malik’s appearance in the eyes of his husband depends on Altaïr’s fickle mood. For a moment, he looks fierce in Altaïr’s eyes, with a menacing scowl equaling Nokem’s, and thick frown contorting his lips. A moment after, Altaïr’s tongue darts out to lick across his chapped skin, his head bursting with thought of Malik’s full lips, the heat of his mouth, of his fiery gaze turning soft. A meek and loyal husband to obey him is all Altaïr had fought for. A taste of domesticity all he desires in exchange for years of sacrifice.

To find Malik loyal to their marriage swells his head with pride and his body with a constant thrum of pleasures to come. He sets his shoulder into the cold stone of the tunnel and falls into anticipatory reverie of reaping his husbandly privileges, and his cock begins to stir at the thought of stripping the frown off Malik’s lips between picking him up and carrying him up to their bed.

Peace pervades this vision for a few undisturbed moments, until one of the eccentric characters of the community whom Altaïr recalls through hazy memory strolls into it carrying an assortment of flowers.

This fair-haired intruder—a man of calling Altaïr had failed to decipher seven years ago—comes to kneel beside Malik and they exchange hushed words before the frown is erased from Malik’s face and the flowers entrusted into his wet, gloved hand.

This misplaced gesture rankles Altaïr, recovering him steadily from his little reverie.

Leonardo’s cold white fingers settle on Malik’s jaw and Altaïr’s domestic fantasy is brought to an untimely death.

Malik’s lips mirror the smile on Leonardo’s face and its reflection distorts Altaïr, he’s afraid to look at it but he can’t resist, until he finds himself inflamed beyond reason and frothing like a wild dog.

He thrusts forth like a wounded beast flinging the drapery aside and drowning the shout of Malik’s name in accusation.

Altaïr’s presence is given notice by the entire community and he shows far greater restraint than he would on the battlefield.

Malik’s gaze lurches to the source of his strident voice, loud and unpleasant, and tainted with filthy accusation. Altaïr watches how Malik’s confusion takes a shape of panic, a wet cloth still dangling from his hand, frozen in this act of collapse.

When Malik sets tongue to purpose his face is dangerously close to terror.

“You’re _alive_?“ Malik’s expression houses utter disbelief, his question spoken with all the emotion such statements entail, and Altaïr is further inflamed by it.

“I trusted the word of an unfaithful husband!” Altaïr roars for all community to hear, drawing the above people from apartments onto balconies, “I have given my word—the fault lies in you for breaking yours, whore!”

Malik’s mouth remains agape, he scowls feverishly, and Altaïr pounces on Malik’s state of bewilderment to hurl offense and balm cracked pride.

“You've abased and shamed yourself while bearing my name—!”

“You’ve shamed _yourself_ , by accusing me of imaginary slights!”

Malik snaps, stands piling up on courage, but Altaïr’s keen eyes dig into the place where Malik’s pulse hammers beneath his skin and it’s all evidence he requires.

“Do not attempt lie, _whore_! The fear in your eyes trained your tongue to lie—the flowers in hand speak the truth.”

Altaïr lets the heavy sack plummet onto stone and the chink of coins joins the rasp of cold steel as he unsheathes his sword.

“Stop now—“ Leonardo barges into the danger area, a comedy of protectiveness, but Altaïr’s eyes won’t bore into him, for if they do his sword might follow. The dazzling flow of chatter around them is unintelligible to Altaïr, his eyes trained only on his husband’s face, the face that stretches into crisp simplicity of derision as Malik thrusts it closer to Altaïr to spill forth what is to become a spear of mockery.

“They are for my brother’s grave,” Malik hisses with some pomp and veers off to storm up the stairs and into his home that is now Altaïr’s.

Altaïr doesn’t stir his limbs to movement at first. He is experiencing what is not a complete surrender to this explanation and stands with hunger for more, but he returns his sword to scabbard even as he shouts after Malik and his orders fall on deaf ears.

Then he follows.

He collects his spoils and bolts up the stairs flanked by statues of [Nokem](http://the-king-of-novices.tumblr.com/post/104486337526/live-forever-or-die-trying-the-pantheon-1-10) and [Gdila](http://the-king-of-novices.tumblr.com/post/104486350666/live-forever-or-die-trying-the-pantheon-2-10), passes apartment doors set to his left before he reaches what is the breaking point between the ring of first and second floor—a large staircase in the midst of which a tunnel is chiseled providing passage to the remaining circle of the first floor. Altaïr takes the left portion of stairs and counts two doors before he stands before his own.

The door is unhinged and he elbows his way inside, and what he finds in the bowels of his home dissolves jealousy into unflattering shame.

Beneath the heel of boots he feels the yielding softness of thick carpet and he recoils in the fraction of a moment, leaving two dusty imprints on the amber rim of the cobalt-blue carpet. Carpets are a rare commodity.

The roomy emptiness of this space has been transformed almost beyond recognition, his house vastly removed from the shabby place he had purchased with hard-earned money short before leaving for war. It’s hard to decide where next to settle his gaze. A dining table flanked by benches with amber plush. To the left, two entire corners embraced by a low sofa littered with cushions, the ceiling above a geometric pattern painted gold-and-blue. He had not felt such sensory experience crush upon him in waves since he last entered Al Mualim’s camp.

Altaïr falls into a crouch.

He sets his crude sack upon floor with a conspicuous chink of coins, sets his helmet beside it, and commences the tedious task of unlacing his boots. Across him in the midst of the room Malik remains still.

Nothing flies from Malik’s mouth now while he stares aside at the hard-polished floor of what was a creaky-and-weathered wood when he first was brought here, finding, perhaps, that the house will explain to Altaïr what his silence does not.

The truth is almost unsettling.

With Altaïr away, Malik—a child turned orphan overnight and left to fend for its own—transformed the space within Altaïr’s four sorry walls into a cozy home worth of flatter. This proves to be Altaïr’s second unexpected surprise of the day. His third—that Malik has been as loyal as he had promised once, at the tender age of ten.

Altaïr’s mouth parts under the weight of this pleasant revelation, but gentle words find difficult the passage from throat to mouth and remain sitting on his tongue for a while longer. On some rational ground, the attractive surroundings inveigle him into feeling like a stray pest imposing on someone else’s home.

A glance to his immediate right provides him good insight into how well Malik managed this household during his absence. The kitchen—a once dingy, smallish room—now a well-equipped wide space with a double-sided hearth cleverly connected to the adjacent bedroom, and a masonry oven resting above. The rest is well-crafted into a pantry and cooking area. Altaïr’s restless eyes wander around and across the colorful assortment of dried foods, a longish clove of garlic hanging alongside two heavy pieces of smoked meat and fat sausages. Tea and spices Altaïr has meager knowledge of rest perched on shelves above the menagerie of jams sealed off in jars, a collection of pitchers and flipped cups is sitting on the lowest shelves.

On the counter-top, a half-eaten bread and a basket of peaches. Below, three brick-red amphoras, one of them as large as a small child, and a sack of flour.

It’s food of more variety than Altaïr had seen in his seven years in soldier encampments.

Altaïr removes his gaze from the kitchen he can hardly deem his own, and finds Malik inspecting him.

“I was in the wrong,” words suddenly pop out from Altaïr’s mouth as he admits regret that would otherwise rot on his tongue unless spoken absent thought.

“Repeat the words to those who now think me a whore.”

“I apologized,” Altaïr stresses in almost-growl.

If Malik hid his flinch, he did it well, as he did with the bitter taste of protest now swallowed to prevent it from leaving his mouth.

He holds still even as Altaïr crosses a distance to peek into the bedroom to Malik’s left. The room is spacious, warm and inviting, with a square bed too large for one adolescent, covered in quilts cobalt like the carpet he stands on, and the overall state of the room further quells Altaïr’s anger.

When Altaïr falls into admiring the polished floor is when Malik next speaks to break silence and shift accusation where it’s well founded.

“Your pay stopped coming three years ago. The reason given was your death upon battlefield.” _I believed you dead for three years_ remains lodged in Malik’s throat.

Altaïr turns to look at him, his face colored in angered puzzlement, “Who told you that?”

“Abbas,” Malik spits the word like a long-festering poison.

“That was a mistake,” or so Altaïr hopes, “I will resolve the matter.”

Altaïr ceases inspection of his bedroom as his attention is drawn to awaiting duties. Of his home, he had expected far less. Of his husband, he had expected more.

Foolish as he was in blind hope, Altaïr had expected his husband to speed to his arms to greet him, to hold his parched hands and smile with teary eyes and thoughts of affection and loyalty. A wrinkled brow and distrust had not been part of his prayers to [Gdila](http://the-king-of-novices.tumblr.com/post/104486350666/live-forever-or-die-trying-the-pantheon-2-9).

“Why did you choose to stay?”

Malik at last stirs from his unmoving posture and lifts his eyes to face Altaïr, and there is nothing lost of the boy who lost one family in one night.

“You mistake choice for the payment of a debt. And a word of loyalty I once gave. Absent it, we wouldn’t be breaking words.”

Altaïr has a not-so-distant memory of a child's fretfulness on a bleak day when he first asked for marriage, and of a child’s thirst for revenge that screamed louder than the _yes_ it whispered before priests. In the expanse of time that stretched from the Massacre up to this point, Malik’s thirst for revenge has not withered as Altaïr hoped it might. His loyalty to Altaïr remains a matter of probity, far-removed from any personal devotion. The knowledge does not surprise, but offers little comfort and provides reason for worry. Altaïr sweeps this intricate matter aside presently.

“How did you manage for money?”

Malik lifts his eyes anew and his dark gaze wraps Altaïr into a cocoon of satisfaction. The embellishments of his home may be distracting, but Malik’s dark, dark eyes are even more so.

When Malik chooses to respond, it’s neither with pride nor with indignation, he speaks as if decisions re-crossed his path and once probably made him unhappy, before he settled into this necessity of life.

“I wash clothes,” between the first two words, there almost is no stutter, “Our community has one of the best tailors of the city. He directs his customers to me. Cloth dyers are on the other slope of the hill, so I have a steady influx of customers. I do finery, mostly, cloth that takes time to wash and brings more money.”

Altaïr’s gaze slips to the odd contraptions on Malik’s arms. Malik’s trade sheds light on the purpose of his leather gloves. Altaïr assumes they were made resistant to soaps and protect his hands, and he commends his self-care. His eyes linger until it crosses the line of decency and Malik shows his dissatisfaction by soldering his leather-bound fingers into fists. Altaïr’s intent did not wander into the realms of insult, even if Malik takes it as one. The gloves look becoming on Malik’s arms, a reality that seems to elude him.

“I also draw maps when occasion beckons. Though it’s not a steady source of income.” Malik’s fists unhinge and hang loose once more. Altaïr recognizes the extent of Malik’s sacrifice but cannot empathize. Malik has been born a noble, a descendant of Nokem. One of the last remaining. Before the Massacre, he had been unused to work the majority of population does. In its aftermath, mundane labor foisted itself upon him.

Altaïr does not empathize.

He appreciates well-deserved reward. Admires work that exceeded initial expectation. For the latter Altaïr admires his husband, who exceeded original role and turned into an all-rounder who produced food, washed upmarket clothes, and took exceptional care of the household.

“Henceforth, you will not have to,” Altaïr says as he nicks to the sack of coins and Malik reluctantly follows his gaze, “I’ve brought spoils from war. They are yours, to use for your purpose.”

Malik’s tepid gaze rests on the sack until the silence between them grows deafening. It’s not the response Altaïr had hoped to entice.

“I deliver joyous news to be met with tempered response.”

“Your money is not fucking wanted. I’ve long learned to fend for myself.”

A hint of ire roams Altaïr’s face for a split moment and Malik is sure they will revert to a crossfire of filthy yelling.

“I am the master of this house and you will follow in my lead.”

The ensuing laughter that surges from Malik’s mouth is unmarred by the indignity of Altaïr’s ruffled look and his angry flare of his nostrils.

“You find my orders amusing?”

“No. The stupid fuck that speaks them.”

Altaïr lurches forward but stops in his tracks in the blink of an eye, and Malik does flinch this time, the residual smile on his lips drops to naught. Malik counts three breaths before Altaïr retreats.

Malik expects him to speak.

When the realization dawns that this burden has fallen upon his shoulders, he shares a look, but finds his own pacifying will irredeemably forfeited.

“A man seldom offers obedience to a husband who named him whore.”

Malik’s tone is soft and softness refuses to make Altaïr’s anger function.

When Altaïr looks into the face of his husband, he finds a hard scowl sitting heavy on his brows, a deep-settled frown chiseled into his lips, and reborn anger searing from his dark eyes. Despite these shortcomings, Malik is an alluring sight. Altaïr feels an abrupt bark of lust, and his nostrils flutter, immediately followed by a drawing of deep breath to calm his body and tame the craving that has been steadily repressed for years on end.

“I said I apologized,” Altaïr repeats even as he fails to realize that he has not.

Altaïr’s gaze slips from Malik’s soft black hair down to his lips, much desired, excessively wet and warm-colored, like peaches. Altaïr feels his appetite swell but shifts eyes elsewhere. He will have Malik. Later.

“I’m called to duty,” Altaïr informs as he returns to the door and takes to putting his boots back on, “I expect a warm meal upon my return. I leave the money into your care, seeing how you handle financial matters lacking my guidance.”

Malik is far from pleased, but whatever words he has to spare remain confined to his own thoughts. He craves Altaïr’s departure and endures every moment spent in his husband’s company with borrowed patience.

“After the meal, I would also enjoy your body.” Altaïr fixes his helmet into place, and this vision wakes unwanted memories and gives Malik no less grief than Altaïr’s preposterous implication.

“Are you asking for sex?” Malik rushes to ask as Altaïr turns to take leave, barely keeping his voice from falling apart.

“I ask nothing. That is how it will be.” From beneath the steely beak of an eagle, Altaïr’s eyes are menacing, and Malik has no doubts he will do as he desires, “And clean yourself, I don’t want to soil my cock.”

Altaïr is turning to leave but Malik’s voice stops him.

“ _Fuck_ you!” Malik shouts after him as soon as his mind has bridged the gap to his frozen mouth.

For the fraction of a moment Malik considers the location of his hidden sword, but Altaïr remains standing and shows no signs of lashing out at him.

“Talk to me again in such tone and I’ll give you a lesson in manners,” a moment of silence and then, “Make supper. Make me a bed. And we’ll revisit that remark.”

The shuddering shock-wave that ensues after the burst of door is felt long after Altaïr’s departure.

The warrior leaves taking hard-earned happiness with him.

 

* * *

 

If Malik had time to spare, he would spend another seven years easing himself into the shock of Altaïr’s arrival.

He takes nothing of the food and all of the spoils, and through his veins shoots more hatred than blood when he slips out leaving his home behind.

Malik reconnoiters the area of the courtyard and finds it bereft people, eerily silent. He twists away from the balustrade and veers left to steal down the stairs while luck is yet on his side. It seems as though the entire community is turning a blind eye to his escape to grant him safe passage unburdened by witnesses.

Malik’s heart weighs heavy, as does the sack of coins he has stolen and hid amid the entwined bundle of clothes. Fear and haste did not permit neat arrangement and his two most prized possessions—two golden cups he saved seven years ago—touch on occasion giving a muted _clink_.

His home lost once again to Al Mualim’s men. First on the night of the Massacre of nobles and now to his lower-born husband.

As he glides down the right portion of the stairs, a recursive loop of muffled clinking follows his steps, until he finds himself on the first floor with the tunnel to his immediate left. He hastens his step and immerses himself into the shadows of the barrel-vaulted tunnel, passing doors. For a moment his chest feels dark and bitterly cold before it turns empty. The stones echo under his heels with a hollow, lonely ring before he slows to a stop three doors short of Leonardo’s home-cum-studio.

In the darkness of the tunnel, dark thoughts begin to assail him.

Malik had avoided the thought of visiting Leonardo before his permanent departure, to spare him the trouble. But Leonardo possesses something Malik would bequeath unto his husband before escape.

While Malik’s flourishing thought takes solid form he shifts the straps of his bag, re-adjusting weight, hoping to further stifle the noisy tumult of a myriad coins, and then he slinks off into Leonardo’s dwelling.

Inside, he finds nothing but a solitary room.

Upon hearing no noise, Malik slopes off into the corner of stacked wooden shelves, disarranged but with contents well-kept, and digs into the task of finding desired object. He spends a few moments in savage search before he finds the correct shelf on a height almost too vast for him to reach, but he pulls it out of socket with a single scrap of noise and finds inside half a bulk of hemlock leaves. He revels in this find for a mere moment and considers taking the entire shelf with him. This notion he discards as soon as it arises, aware of the blame that would fall on Leonardo for poisoning Altaïr, should this evidence be found in another’s home.

Malik turns and twists in search for a scrap of cloth to wrap the poison plant into, but finds none. He would best avoid touching the leaves.

He lifts the edge of his long robe and winds it round the poison with as much care as pressing circumstance permits, and rolls the leaves in, keeping his fist firmly closed around this impromptu wrapping.

A blanket of calm has barely covered his chest when approaching steps hurl him into rushed feat of slipping the shelf back into proper place.

Malik swirls around just in time to give his alarmed face a false sense of calm as Leonardo catches sight of him.

“Malik?”

Malik doesn’t answer but he does swallow the excess build of saliva beneath tongue as Leonardo begins to approach, an act hidden well in the deep shadows of Malik’s black hood.

Leonardo comes to a halt before him and Malik makes no move, not even a shift of his awkwardly-placed hand clutching the wrapped poison, half-hidden behind his back. His baggage is not visible to the eye beneath his hooded robe, but his hiding of poison has revealed his chest and leather straps open for Leonardo’s inspection.

Malik has long learned that lying to Leonardo is a futile task unworthy of attempt.

He allows the man to slip hands into his hood and flick this shield off, leaving himself exposed.

“Your eyes betray recent tears.” Leonardo’s pale brows contort with empathy as he sinks his fingers into the soft skin of Malik’s neck and digs thumbs up Malik’s jaw to direct dark eyes at himself.

Malik expects another onslaught of empathy he welcomes for once, but Leonardo is not one to be deceived.

“What are you hiding?”

Malik is struck dumb with sudden terror.

Leonardo’s fingers give a short squeeze and his mouth stretches into one of his smiles that stop short of the corners of his eyes and don’t make them crinkle, “What’s in your hand, Malik?”

Malik lets the wave of shock freeze and unfreeze his body before he tries a puny attempt at evading truth, a task set for fail before being uttered.

“What hand?”

“The one you’re hiding behind your back.”

Malik manages half a breath before stammering out, “Leonardo—“

“Show me,” Leonardo cuts in and lets one hand fall to keep it open in silent offer.

Protest is futile and Malik brings his hand up dragging his robe along, and then opens his fist. Leonardo unwraps the contents and is not pleased. A scowl twists his brows while he empties the hemlock onto a counter and lets Malik’s black robe fall to floor before planting him onto a stool.

Leonardo keeps his anger in a more orderly fashion than he keeps his studio in, but his quiet anger is far nastier and more violent that livid shouting. Malik isn’t sure what to expect as Leonardo drags a second stool to sit before him.

“Did you think you would benefit from the murder of your husband?”

“A husband in name only.”

“Don’t change course of conversation.”

Malik lifts his gaze off Leonardo’s sandals and looks him in the eye.

“I’m running away.”

This silencer provides enough time for Malik to continue before Leonardo’s recovery.

“I wished him dead before I went. He would put me in shackles, Leonardo. He ordered meal, ordered my body like a piece of meat. I _hate_ him—“

“And for hatred you would give your own life?” Leonardo bends to seize Malik’s hands resting on his knees and fastens his hold on them, “Where in the city will you hide where Altaïr won’t find you? He is as alone as you are. You are all he has beside his home.”

Malik’s face scrunches up in revolt and he shifts his gaze to the side in childish defiance, but Leonardo’s grip tightens around his wrists before the man jerks him closer, and Malik does look him in the eye then.

“You may carry your hatred inside you like Nokem did before slaying his enemy, but be obedient to Altaïr, show him affection—“

“ _Never_.” Malik protests in shrill outrage.

“Malik, _listen_.” The grip on Malik’s wrists constricts and Malik is compelled to consider Leonardo’s ensuing words.

“On this day, to this city returned those who think they survived the war.”

Malik looks into these words, _truly_ delves into them, lets them sink in while he waits for the man to go on.

“They’ve grown tired of blood and dust, and poor rations. They hunger for a warm home sweetened by the attentions of their wives and husbands and family, they hunger for a warm meal and warm hands to caress and soothe their battered spirits.” Leonardo takes pause as he sees Malik mull over his words, and uses the chance to allow Malik’s hands into his lap, “Altaïr wishes to be attended by his husband. Your affection and obedience is all he wants.”

“I don’t want his brutish hands upon me,” the very thought makes Malik sick to the stomach, “I’ll have to tolerate his presence in _my_ home.”

“An unavoidable concession, Malik.”

Malik immerses himself into this notion and begins to understand that sleeping beside his husband is a necessity that has to be swallowed.

Leonardo’s thumbs stroke languidly up-and-down the length of his own, joined together and pressed between the man’s warm palms, and when he next forces himself into lifting his gaze from this sight, Leonardo’s visage grows blurred under onslaught of tears whose origin he doesn’t want to ponder.

“How do I live with a beast for the rest of my life?” he asks in a whisper.

“See the beast tamed then,” Leonardo’s cottony voice is a balm unrivaled by any of those stacked on shelf upon shelf inside his studio. He reaches for the hem of his cape, a much-beloved addition to his tunic, and presses its inner fold to Malik’s jaw to soak up what he never wanted to see on Malik’s face again, “You must ascend to your position through gentle touch and make your husband merely the beast you ride upon.”

“I would be betraying my brother. I would be betraying my family...”

Leonardo’s remaining hand joins to frame Malik’s face, keeping his chin upright and his gaze unflinching.

“It’s too late to consider such notions now. It’s been long since you gave your consent to this marriage.”

Malik takes a three-breaths-worth of pause to wallow in this folly.

“He will know I’m pretending. He’ll see through my lies. No words will hide my look of hatred.”

“Play a loving husband. Submit to his will. He will never know that you hate him, he will never know you’re lying, Malik. The day will come when you’ll lose sight of hateful intention.”

“He gave me grievance, I cannot forgive.“

“You’ve barely spent time with the man. Have you told him what grieves you?“

“He knows.“

“Does he?“

Malik shifts away from Leonardo’s doting to frown in displeasure, but ditches proper response.

“It’s no matter. He holds the reigns now.“

Leonardo gives the softest chuckle and lets the dampened hem of his cape fall after he retreats into proper sitting. His soothing proximity is presently missed.

“I wouldn’t be so sure in that, Malik. His position is deceptively weak—you require nothing of him, yet he requires a lot from you.“

“How is that helping my case…?“

“You hold the reigns. Or rather, you could, if you learn how to hold them.“

Malik makes no move, nor intention to shift hands from Leonardo’s lap where they are resting, awkwardly joined.

“Start with the meal. Feed him.” Leonardo instructs, “Go and hasten preparations for fresh bread and set pot for stew. I will fetch you fresh meat from the market.”

Malik’s eyelids fall shut in the midst of acquiescent nodding, prompting old tears to escape at last. He doesn’t expect Leonardo to wind his hand round his neck anew to pull him into the comforting silence of his chest.

Leonardo parts his thighs to accommodate him and Malik shifts pulling the stool with him as he sinks deeper into Leonardo’s firm embrace and the man indulges him, gives him a moment of peace, losing count of how many times he did so during the course of Malik’s unfortunate childhood.

The day grows short.

 

* * *

 

Altaïr finds them seated on the rim of a fountain.

Two fine warriors, most fierce in battle, most warm-hearted in friendship.

Ezio reclines on elbows with head tilted up, buttoned up to his neck in good humor while taking the sun. On his right, Desmond sits hunched over his knees twirling a half-shredded leaf between thumb and index finger, as if assessing its value. They rest thus with their backs facing the colossal temple to Gdila, the patron god of city warriors, beloved of Nokem.

Altaïr’s eyes don’t stray from the duo while he slips through between two plump bases of massive columns that frame the space of the main forum.

“I’m well-fucked,” Ezio informs with a juicy grin when Altaïr comes to a halt before them.

“And I’m one quarter drunk,” Desmond tacks on.

Altaïr sighs through his helmet and feels a pierce of envy at their bare-headed state while a dewy sheen of sweat sticks to his temples.

“Good to know.” He shifts his gaze around the forum watching citizens mill about, not one warrior among them, “We’ll arrive past appointed hour.”

“You excel at making friends, Altaïr,” Ezio jabs, shifting into position resembling Desmond’s.

“I need but two.”

“Good for you, seeing as you only have us.” Desmond’s loop-sided smirk quietens Altaïr’s temper which is easy prey to irritation in current circumstances, “The assembly has been cancelled.” Desmond adds at last.

“ _What_?”

“Al Mualim holds the roundup tomorrow, at the very place we loiter presently.”

Altaïr exhales his ill temper and hooks his thumbs into the eagle beak pulling his helmet off. He ruffles his short hair up and wipes off the shine of perspiration sitting above his upper lip, leaving his temples dampened with sweat and his mood sour.

“Why drag me away from home then?”

“Well we didn’t know, did we?” Ezio pats the tepid stone at his left in silent invitation.

Altaïr response is not immediate. He stares at the fountain floor behind Ezio’s back, the colored mosaic distorted beneath the ripple of water. On it, mermaid-like [Daga](http://the-king-of-novices.tumblr.com/post/105887755561/live-forever-or-die-trying-the-pantheon-4-10) holds out a fish in offer to the god of death hiding behind Desmond’s form. Altaïr shifts gaze, thinking. He feels hunger licking at his insides until he feels less like a man and more like a belly with some accessory organs.

He chooses to join them.

He had spent seven years fighting beside these men, another hour won’t hurt.

Altaïr takes a seat on the assigned place and slots his helmet alongside the two already resting on the fountain rim, their long tails conveniently coiled into rolls to preemptively dodge dust on pavement. The lining inside is dampened as much as his spirits and he leaves it to dry, but takes to coiling his own helmet tail up while they sit in easy silence. The harsh sun beats down on them reflecting in the phosphor-bronze of his eagle beak and hitting Altaïr’s eyes while he combs through the long strands of tawny horse-hair plume with the tip dyed ivory.

“When was the last time you saw your family?” Altaïr asks lifting his gaze from the thick coil of silky strands, his question is ostensibly a question, and tipped more towards accusation.

In the void of silence that follows the question, Altaïr listens to the rasp and tinkle of traffic on the main road stretching a distance away before the temple forum. Ahead, the city is spread out, overseen by the vertiginous summit of [Hiba](http://the-king-of-novices.tumblr.com/post/105028879746/live-forever-or-die-trying-the-pantheon-3-9)’s hill, home to the ancient and most sacred forest of their island. Behind [Hiba](http://the-king-of-novices.tumblr.com/post/105028879746/live-forever-or-die-trying-the-pantheon-3-9)’s mountain, a glimpse of a flat-topped volcano, frozen in death since the time Nokem killed the god of mountains inside it, now host to warrior encampments. And countless corpses.

“You’re wasting time on lecture. I’ll go see them so—“

His word ceases abruptly as his torso shoots backwards, his legs follow in an open-and-frozen sprawl as if some force has pulled at him. There is a spurt of a broken shout before the luscious splash of water as Ezio falls into the fountain.

“Ezio, you _scum_!”

Not a moment passes before Desmond and Altaïr startle up like coiled springs, drawing their swords at this garrulous impostor who slithered behind their backs on the sly.

The hooded figure stands proud atop forfeited seats with a coltish smirk stretching ruddy lips that bring to light the identity of the one person that could lash at Ezio and receive their congratulatory pats on shoulder. A restless, reckless woman.

“ _Claudia_!” Ezio bellows in a mixture of shock and upset, and her mouth parts into a toothy grin, her lips smack of utter mischief.

“Go on, brother, your tears sustain me.”

Desmond chuckles as he and Altaïr sheathe their weapons and watch Claudia pull her hood off to stretch her hands out in tacit invitation. Ezio unbridles his dissatisfaction with a groan and wades through water to worm himself into her embrace.

Ezio is half a step away, his cloth and hair ill with desire for a good wringing, when Claudia’s dry hand connects with his wet cheek in a loud smack and Ezio sways sidewise from the impact.

“That’s for not dispatching a message,” she explains in a voice removed from any passion.

Ezio’s shoulders hunch inward under some weight of guilt but there’s a frown sitting on his lips as he turns to face her. Claudia kills the ease Ezio seems to have settled into with another slap, possessed of more vigor, and Ezio needs a moment to recover from this unexpected turn.

“That’s for not letting me go with you.”

Though her voice stands firm, from the spot he stands at, Altaïr thinks he can recognize an underlying knot of something more profound on her face, a sentiment that, perhaps, steals into the outstretch of arms that now seem more welcoming than before.

Altaïr doesn’t know if Ezio, too, has noticed this shift in her demeanor, but Ezio shuffles up to her and lets Claudia wind her smaller-but-strong arms around his soaked form.

A moment of this idyll before Claudia shoves her brother a distance away and delivers another slap to the sore cheek leaving Ezio fantastically astonished, standing in knee-high water with a dumbfounded expression on his face and cheeks inked in fat pink.

“That was removed from my will. It was from mother.”

The look on Ezio’s abused face morphs from utter betrayal to utter horror, and his comrades watch, in something that is an amalgam of growing amusement and mounting sympathy, as Ezio’s confidence shatters into shambles.

“Set mind to ease, idiot. I didn’t tell her. But I will, should you stray from path again,” Claudia assures, and on her face is the look of a gloriously fulfilled, almost fulfilled, woman.

She holds out her hand and Ezio takes it with a wary look. After she steps down he takes her place on the fountain rim, allowing his garment to drip with excess water.

“How many beds did you visit until now? One? Two?”

“You insult me, sister.”

“None?”

“Three,” Ezio gives in. Claudia could, without doubt, get her hands on concealed truths within an hour from now, through means obscure even to brightest minds of the city, and lying to Claudia is as impractical as it is foolish.

“Lousy performance. Unworthy of an Auditore. I get more women in less time,” Claudia turns to Desmond and her hand comes out and holds itself upwards under his nose demanding money, “You owe me coin.”

“Thank you, Ezio,” Desmond grumbles with no ire and produces a quick coin, as if this lost bet had already been suspected.

“ _Wait_ —what? How high was the wager?” Ezio hides behind the demand to soothe his insulted sexual prowess, as if the bet didn’t involve his number of conquests at all.

“One kesef,” Desmond replies and lets himself be directed by Altaïr who is shifting their positions along the curvy expanse of the stone rim, but remains unseated himself, as though preparing himself leeway for departure.

“You’re insane. That’s the daily pay of a skilled artisan,” awed as he might be, Ezio is pressed to his sister’s breast and held there during Claudia’s endeavor to wring his hair out, “And look at the state of me now, sister.”

“A sad sodden little creature. Same as before.”

Ezio’s humphs in mock anger but falls readily into this doting, allows Claudia to maneuver his head up for an onslaught of sisterly kisses.

Altaïr swings his gaze from this odd display of affection to Desmond who sits hunched again, with a hint of a smile on his face while the hum of Claudia’s pleased noises and the soft smack of her kisses peppered across Ezio’s face permeate the lack of conversation. Desmond can probably grasp the essence of sibling affection as good as Altaïr can, which is to say far from good. For one adventurous moment, Altaïr’s mind attempts inserting himself into this picture, with Malik in Claudia’s stead. It doesn’t come as a surprise when this image resists imagination and wrestles itself from Altaïr's mind claiming improbability.

Thoughts of his husband and the nagging sensation of hunger nudge his limbs into action, and he reaches for his helmet and lifts it without Desmond’s protest, letting the tail unfurl from the coil. He is thumbing along the inner lining to test its dryness and preparing to leave when Claudia halts his intention.

“And you, Altaïr? How do you find your husband?” She calls across Desmond.

Altaïr looks her in the eye with genuine wonder, and finds upon her face a smile, almost hidden by the swell of her cheek pressed against the crown of Ezio’s head, a smile which knows how handsome Malik has turned in these seven years of Altaïr’s absence.

“You know of him?”

“I know _everything_.” She tells in a nigh whisper and with an air of conviction that Altaïr has no doubt is based upon foundations of granite. Altaïr needs a handful of moments to select an answer.

“We are at odds.”

Ezio shifts to rest his head upon her lap, and he is oddly silent. Altaïr takes notice of his silence and listens to Claudia.

“Give him time to grow used to your presence. You, too, would fall into distrust if backed into corner and pressed into roles never played before.” Her gaze is knowing, her words both instruction and advice, and Altaïr doesn’t know into which class to put them. He bends from this course of subject.

“It seems he had thought me dead.”

“How so?”

“Misinformed. By none other than Abbas.”

Her fingers still in Ezio’s damp hair and her visage converts to repulsion that is mutually shared, “The snake that slithers behind you?”

Altaïr tumbles into a scowl and follows the direction of her gaze shortly thereafter, but he can’t spot Abbas despite best efforts to recognize a face among the roaming people, none of which resemble the target. He turns to find Desmond in a similar state of confusion, and for an instance he doubts the validity of her find.

“He’s not here.”

“Who are you going to trust? Me or your lying eyes?” She pulls her mouth into a smirk, “The dark figure in cloak and hood, Altaïr.”

He tries anew and his eyes land on the one shape of such description, and as chance would want it, there stands Abbas, bereft of armor, in plain clothes, and dark hood. His lack of armor doesn’t come as a surprise. His beard does. As does his right eye. An eye not his own, but plain to see, and not unalike Al Mualim’s.

Altaïr has last seen him with cloth and patch hiding the irreparable damage Malik’s tiny hands had once inflicted upon Abbas’ face. His current appearance brings much amazement. He stands at the foot of the forum in the company of a figure of a more questionable repute, one possessed of riches, if the foreign clothes are a hint to judge by.

“That man has his fingers in everyone’s assholes.” Desmond’s words are uncouth, but worth a sack of gold. Knowledge of shared sentiment axes some of the fury that simmers in Altaïr at the very sight of this man he once shared ranks with.

Altaïr puts his helmet on and fixes it into place, and fixes his mind on purpose, “I’ve words to exchange with him.”

“Be cautious,” Claudia instructs as he makes move to leave, “He speaks in honeyed words, to conceal the piss that leaves his mouth.”

Altaïr launches into a steady march.

Abbas is bidding his company farewells and doesn't see Altaïr’s sudden approach. He never was one for the warrior ranks. Discharge must have fattened him up into further idleness.

“Abbas,” Altaïr calls to draw attention and the man turns to him together with a staggered expression upon face. Altaïr’s alert eyes roam his new face in hunt for signs of guilt, but find the beginnings of a bogus smile, baleful and full of ominous verve that doesn’t bode well. Altaïr has no appetite for Abbas, and even less appetite for being swindled of money he had assigned for his husband.

“I seek information.”

“On what subject?”

Strict to the point, no gab. Altaïr hopes to keep it so and to dodge any idle talk. Altaïr moves a step closer to make himself appear as assertive as he feels. Abbas’ face slinks a sliver into the shadow of his cowl and his eye flits briefly down to Altaïr’s sword, one Abbas no longer lays claims on. He is growing skittish and Altaïr is pleased with this outcome.

“You delivered false news. And stole money diverted from its right course. I would see it restored to proper place.”

“You name me a thief, Altaïr. Be careful who you cross.” Abbas’ voice carries false bravado and Altaïr is convinced of his guilt, has been even before exchanging word. He sees the smile to a death as he forges another step, backing Abbas into the gap of space between two columns.

“I name you so because you are so.”

There’s a moment between Altaïr’s methodical cutting of space and his low-spoken words, in which time Abbas manages to hoard salt for Altaïr’s open wound. A wound that seems to be familiar to all those who should not meddle with it, which is everyone.

“What gnaws at you really, Altaïr?” Abbas’ unsightly grin widens, its weight feels like a stone in his empty gut, “Do you truly care for the money? Or do you care for how your whelp managed costs of living?” Abbas’ grin is brazen and ugly and growing as he leans in to wound pride in whispers, “ _I_ will tell you how, Altaïr. Your little husband, fucked to madness by a thousand cocks—“

Altaïr feels the grip of his fingers on Abbas’ neck long before he hears his own snarling growl—the sound of a wounded animal with rabid hunger for vengeance, and it feels as if Nokem himself is guiding his hands as he drives Abbas’ choking form into the base of the column and rams the back of his skull into the stone, once, before he inclines his face towards the bulging one, misshapen with slow swelling and blotches of purplish-red.

“You will return every. Fucking. Coin. Or I’ll cut off your cock and feed it _to your fucking mouth_!”

There’s an essential difficulty to keep his sword sheathed and free of Abbas’ innards, and he makes use of last remnants of good judgment to bash the man’s skull in a last time, for a good measure, and releases his hold on Abbas.

He walks home alone, his empty stomach tied in knots, and doubt gripping fast on his heart.

The ego bruises deeper than the flesh.

 

* * *

 

Malik is sweating and patting the dough into shape when the door opens.

He is hoping for Leonardo, but Altaïr puts his nose into the kitchen and regards him with quiet suspicion.

It would be a pleasure to flatten this man’s nose. Altaïr’s face darkens into a scowl upon taking note of Malik’s current work, but this moment of unfounded annoyance unfurls into something that could resemble satisfaction as Altaïr catches sight of awaiting food assembled on the counter to Malik’s left.

Altaïr backs off and away to settle on the table, not a word leaving his mouth. Malik is glad for the silence. Silence he could work with.

The kitchen is hot, sweltering as a result of the cooling oven and recently snuffed fire, and Malik covers the excess dough with clean cloth and cleans his hands, dabs the sweat from his face. The table is laid out, table linen spread, and Altaïr sits wrapped in silence, awaiting meal. Altaïr has an ax to grind with his husband on several issues weighing heavy on his mind, but this wish is halted by a great redeeming hunger.

Malik leaves the kitchen bearing a large bowl of steaming stew, simmered slowly on low fire, laden with fresh meat and fresh vegetables, and seasoning of price Malik could have wept for were the budget for this costly addition not extracted from Altaïr’s spoils.

Altaïr is expecting a spoon and bowl to eat from, but Malik persists with a steady influx of food.

Malik feels the thrill of accomplishment and postpones setting the cutlery before all his work is laid out on the table like a piece of art. From the corner of his eye, he steals occasional looks to watch for reaction, but his husband looks onto these offers with a black expression. To stifle the surge of disappointment, Malik conveniently blames it on Altaïr’s hunger.

Altaïr regards the table, and everywhere there is food insulting him in huge, wasteful piles.

Small loaves of bread are round and hot, almost spilling from the basket. Silver plates, warm and of unknown origin, loaded with mountains of food—a cheese vast like a grindstone, strings of smoked sausages, a great yellow block of butter, piles of soft-boiled vegetables, and roasted meat tender in thick gravy.

It’s food that became kickshaw in the seven years of soldier encampments.

Malik sets bowl and cutlery before him and his abrupt physical proximity jolts Altaïr from inner lament over this lavish and unnecessary treat.

His husband’s hands look clean and soft, unalike his toughened and rough ones, and his arms smell of scented balms and dough. His tunic has a soapy scent. Altaïr is promptly reminded of Malik’s line of work.

Malik fetches a single cup to fill with contents of the terracotta ewer he carries in hand.

Altaïr has not seen such cups since the Massacre. They are silver, with a bulky base progressively thinning out and expanding upwards into a blossom of steely feathers akin to those adorning Nokem’s turban, seemingly holding the cup in place. Altaïr’s suspicion grows but his tongue stays still. He unfastens the buckle keeping his sword in place while Malik is pouring liquid into his cup, and when he hauls the sword up to set on table, the dishes burst into a clatter. Malik balks at the sheer impact of this action—a motion accentuated by the slosh of wine as he jolts the ewer to himself.

Altaïr takes notice of this reaction. He doesn’t offer apology. He takes the sword off the table and lays it out across the amber plush of the bench he is sitting on.

Malik sets the wine ewer down and remains standing beside the table.

“Will you not eat?” Altaïr asks.

“I already did,” comes a prompt lie. His belly is empty and refuses food.

“Sit,” Altaïr orders flicking his hand at the bench across.

Malik complies without protest and settles on the spot where the bowl of stew conceals him most from Altaïr’s sight. When he chooses to glance at Altaïr he finds him eating, not looking, and seeing Altaïr wolf down two loaves before even starting the stew gives Malik only a ghost of joy, directed primarily at his own culinary prowess.

Altaïr pours into his bowl a healthy amount of stew between the second and the third loaf of bread, and keeps stirring the steaming dish into something cooler during the course of gobbling up the third loaf.

Altaïr’s vulgar slurping grates Malik’s nerves. His loud chewing makes him irritable. He knows he is victim to this duty, bound to the table until Altaïr’s finish, and he finds his gaze drifting off to the right and through the window to allow the dusk creeping up the sky to sway his attention from current task. Attending his husband through meal is a chore of more weight than hours of washing clothes.

His eyes slither down the upper apartments to Leonardo’s home, set on the ring of the first floor. Leonardo’s advice enters his thoughts and he vaguely considers how to further mellow Altaïr out.

Maybe if he summons a bit of charm, Altaïr won’t bother him tonight.

“Is it to your liking, husband?” Malik hears himself say without real thought, for if he spent time on working the details of his words out, they would not be as soft-spoken and aimed at pleasing.

Altaïr swallows a spoon of stew, more liquid than meat in it, and says, “Less spice next time.”

A silence grows inside Malik.

He watches the warrior slurp on the stew he had put heart into, left with only resentment in chest and no further wish to please his husband.

 _Less spice next time_. All his work reduced to nothing in a moment, an instant. The remark equal to writing his cooking off as bosh. His hours of sweating in the kitchen were for naught—evidently, his effort is worth nothing.

“You are behaving as I expect of you, at last.”

Altaïr’s words further aggravate Malik’s attempt at keeping calm.

Malik’s tearful anger hisses inside him and the gleam of sword-handle on the table looks seductive. It takes a colossal amount of restraint to not run the blade through the mouth that formed these words.

He had been full of vain hope, and things are marching badly. He is silent because it’s no use arguing. He had seen people attempt to argue with warriors, a task that did not bear desired fruits of labor. As further insult, Altaïr abandons his spoon with a clatter and doesn’t touch the rest of the food. Stew and bread. Stew is all he bothered to taste.

“Clear the table,” Altaïr orders after setting his drained cup down.

The cup he allowed to touch Altaïr’s mouth. The one he had recovered and salvaged from the ashes of his real home, together with a mismatched assortment of silverware he had assembled from charred debris with hot tears in eyes.

Altaïr leaves the table taking his sword with him to the left wedge-shaped part of the sofa where he spreads himself out on the bolstered cushions amid the lumbar throw pillows with filled belly and contented sigh. He burrows his armored, unclean, unworthy body into the soft-padded coziness of his home, reeking of arrogance.

Malik does the ordered task stripped of any emotion other than the simmering venom of spreading hatred. His belly is empty, his appetite long dead, his mouth devoid of hunger, but his heart thirsts for revenge.

Altaïr doesn’t move, except for a subtle incline onto his left side to ease digestion.

After his anger grows too much in size to put it off any longer, Malik fixes a pouch onto the belt of his tunic. One blade, one candle, one bouquet, one intention. This is all he collects while making preparations to leave. He doesn’t light a lamp to put on table, to avoid waking Altaïr from slumber.

He puts his robe on and his hood up, but words halt him at the door.

“Where do you intend?”

They are in shadows of the night and shadows of the home, and Malik would find nothing to look at even if he turned gaze away from door to look at Altaïr from beneath his hood.

“I go to put flowers on my brother’s grave.”

“I will come along.” Altaïr rises to sitting position.

“I go alone—“

“No, you don’t understand,” Altaïr says in full height, and Malik refuses to face him, however asinine this move, “You may cease lead now. Ever since I returned you do not take lead here. You follow.”

Malik stares into the dark void of darkness that makes his door, his hold on the cold bronze of the handle tightens in response to this ludicrous notion of a lunatic man.

“The man that follows is forever the shadow on your back.”

Altaïr gives no reply. Nor does he move.

The silence he has immersed Altaïr in gives him strange joy. He recalls the lessons Leonardo had bestowed upon him, lesson of steering Altaïr to his liking through virtue of spoken word, and when he speaks next there is less emotion and more cold calculation, and none of the ominous dark in his voice.

“You are not invited. Your presence at my brother’s grave offends me.” Altaïr gives no word in reply and Malik thrusts a hint of a push against the door, “I go alone.”

He leaves.

Altaïr doesn’t follow.

 

* * *

 

Ten or fifteen people are wandering the courtyard.

Malik pulls the hood down his face and the flowers tighter to his chest and rounds the entire first floor to evade a friend sweeping the stairs of his shortcut.

Children are capering around the torch-lit courtyard and filling the space with ringing laughter, their last ambitious play of tonight before being collected by their parents.

After he gets some distance away with two girls and a small boy chasing after his long billowy robes and stopping short before the tunnel, he continues onwards alone. A single torch is flaring at the entrance to the tunnel, the niche a few steps down the path and to the left is swathed in darkness.

Malik takes the candle from his pouch to set alight against the blazing torch and finds Nokem alone when he slips into the niche to seat himself before the god, and sees himself into the cozy darkness of Nokem’s presence, a constant companion in his life.

People who carry a blade to Nokem are starving for revenge, or near it.

Malik sets the candle onto the base peppered with coins and sits before Nokem with downcast eyes. Nokem’s eyes have seen an abundance of blood spilled from Malik’s wrist, but it has been a long time since he last sacrificed blood. A blood sacrifice is to be pawned in the last extremity, one Malik found himself facing in this very moment.

His lips part with a soft smack while he mulls over his words.

“Father...” he starts with a modest whisper. He stands among the group of a handful remaining who may address this revered god thus. He lifts his gaze and tenderly upon him is the benign gaze of Nokem.

“I didn’t mean to usurp your rest.” The softest smile pulls at his lips as Nokem’s forgiving eyes fill his belly with warmth. He takes the collection of flowers assembled by Leonardo, as every year upon this day, and puts it beside the god’s feet, away from the sputtering candle.

“Give these flowers to your brother and he will give them to my. I could not visit Kadar’s resting place today, I beg forgiveness for it.” This decision was born of a clear mind but a heavy heart. Had Altaïr followed him, he would have discovered that Kadar’s grave had been shifted.

Malik gnaws on his lips and his gaze plummets, for mere moments before climbing up, for he cannot ask favor while looking away from the god who gave birth to his people, now buried dead along the corpse of Nokem’s enemy.

“Instruct me, Father, I need guidance.” The god’s dark eyes are benevolent and warm, and Malik feels the steely grip of loneliness loosen. He feels for the blade in his pouch blindly and pulls it out by the handle, keeps it steady in hand and tipped downward.

“My brother is no more. Perhaps I should try to forgive. But I cannot. I’m not possessed of two hearts, one for hatred and one for forgiveness. The heart I have knows only grief.”

Malik sits on his robes but the stone below soaks his flesh into coldness. He shuffles up, drawing nearer to the statue to feel the warmth of the god, to feel closer to his cordial presence. He tips his head up to not let his hushed breath stray towards flickering candle and whispers on.

“My prayer and my devotion, my life and my death—all belong to you. But my sorrow belongs to me. As does my hatred. When a single innocent being is killed, it’s as though all have done the crime,” his heart drums with excitement and loathing as he cushions the blade’s sharp edge against his wrist and holds there, “Strengthen me with my dead brother, Father, and see me to proper path. And see my husband swept from it.”

Malik leaves the dripping poison of his last words to Nokem’s ears and drops gaze to his soft, uncut wrist. The veins beneath are a web of vibrant blue, rich with warm offering and ready to be cut. The blade leaves an imprint but doesn’t break skin as he keeps pressing its full length without drawing blood, but he imagines a steady trickle of ruby-red gleaming under the flicker of candle.

The blade stays docile as a piercing _something_ bores into his chest from inside, leaving it open and vulnerable to fleeting thoughts of hesitance. Malik’s desire for revenge never seemed to grown thinner, not until now. A faint flush of regret, however muffled and feeble, worms itself into the open wound of his chest and festers there like a burgeoning disease.

Leonardo’s voice of good judgment is groping through the pits of his mind until the realization surfaces amid the bile of vengeance he’s been wallowing in. This small slip-up is seized by his conscience in speedy momentum and putting him into manacles at last, until the blade on his wrist is useless and refuses cutting.

Malik has almost cursed Altaïr to damnation.

 _Almost_ sits on his tongue like a foul swallow, until his mind settles and he puts his blade to a rest. As Malik’s decision takes solid form he feels thankful, for the first time in his life, that he wasn’t born a woman.

Women are elevated in the eyes of gods because of bleeding, exempt from spilling blood to seal a blessing or curse. They need only voice it during their monthly sacrifice of blood, their word alone needed to seal divine pacts, which makes them more powerful. This is the power they wield, and they wield it with utmost care.

Malik has been less careful. Yet his blood remains unspilled, his curse remains incomplete and void, for the simple reason of being a man.

Soon he is wracked with guilt for the severity of this almost curse, torn between desire for justified revenge and the crippling notion of irreversible effect of a blood-sealed curse.

Fatigued with twisting between bad right and right wrong, he deposits the blade into the pouch and attempts fending off the regret of quitting the sacrifice. It is direct affront to everything he came here for.

He thinks until he can’t think anymore, and lays the riot of emotion to a rest, puts the candle out, and leaves his torn insides in present injured state to curl up against the cold stone.

 

* * *

 

Malik finds Altaïr standing upright on their (His, not their. _His_.) bed.

Malik’s bed stands at an odd angle. It’s pushed into a corner until all that remained was the corner gap shrewdly filled in with a wedge-shaped shelf, rich in books (a collection of a traveled reader) and rising tall above the bed level. At the crown of the shelf is a sturdy brass hook matching the one protruding from the ceiling and centered above bed. Today, the hooks are bare. During the mosquito season, a canopy net is keeping the bed shrouded by night, and by day fastened onto the shelf hook.

Altaïr stands atop the bed with feet sunken in the blue-shaded bedspread. Malik catches him leafing through a tally where he keeps note of business transactions and expenditures. Malik has nothing to hide and so he says nothing, despite the bitterness at having his possessions disturbed absent his consent.

Altaïr’s armor is neatly stacked onto the only free footstool, as if he didn’t know where else to put it. Malik can’t resist natural impulse to look and his eyes wander timidly over the state of Altaïr’s undress. Only to consider the extent of his cleanliness.

Malik takes a grudging step forward into his old sanctuary and new prison, pointedly keeping his head absent pondering and unsoiled by thoughts of the other man’s presence. Altaïr probably discovered his secret corner during this heedless investigation.

He passes the human-sized statue of Nokem sitting with spear in hand—an heirloom carved from precious onyx, a joyful discovery among the wreckage of his home, heaved onto stolen cart by a child’s hands, hauled and towed uphill for hours on end, polished off and preserved. He allows himself clean nightclothes from the trunk and shambles out of his tunic short of blushing.

Altaïr blindly returns the tally to its proper post and climbs off bed never letting his keen gaze stray from his husband’s disrobed body, however fleeting the moment. The caramel-colored tan of Malik’s skin appeals to Altaïr’s eyes. It’s similar to his own skin, but unmarred by scars. He finds no fault in the shape of his body, variously different to his own, but pleasing to the eye, with supple skin craving Altaïr’s grip. This momentary desire vanishes as Malik passes the bed and rambles out into the kitchen to return with a pitcher in hands.

Malik knows his time for evading bed grows short, but he pours libation into Nokem’s bowl and makes a show of praying to the god. Upon ceasing what he never began, Malik remains standing, with brooding silence and tightening grip on the pitcher of water, the notion of sex hovering around him like a bad stench.

“Come closer to me,” Altaïr orders from the bed.

“To what purpose?”

“Need there be one?”

Malik knows it’s expected of him to do as asked, but he has more appetite for throwing himself off a cliff like goddess [Daga](http://the-king-of-novices.tumblr.com/post/105887755561/live-forever-or-die-trying-the-pantheon-4-10). He keeps his eyes firmly fixed on Nokem’s incensed visage, shifting focus to Altaïr only after the man begins speech again.

“I find my appetite growing.”

Malik turns his gaze to the warrior, “You want me to cook again?” he asks this lucid question. A scowl oozes onto his face when he catches on Altaïr’s face something that could be called a smile.

“No, my desires are of a more intimate nature.”

A sense of fear starts seeping into Malik’s limbs, rooting him to spot. Altaïr’s mind is filled with baser thoughts, his words have a vile, sour odor.

“I am to lie with you?”

“It’s your duty as my husband—“

“I will not do it.”

Altaïr’s demand is not met and it colors his face into a heavy frown, “You misunderstand. I do not ask, I command you—“

“ _Command_? You mistake me for a slave,” Malik spits while untrue bravado moves him to livid words.

Altaïr rises from bed.

He stands tall and Malik sees what he chose not to acknowledge until present. His husband is not from an army of amateurs but professionals whose sole profession is warfare. It was what they did, it was what they breathed, what they ate, what they slept—it was who they were. Altaïr is bigger, a soldierly man of twenty-seven years, a strapping and good-looking man. The latter is irrelevant. Malik’s ill feelings for him have grown immensely fat from just looking at his face.

“I’ve fought for seven years giving body and soul to the defense of my city. Your security and that of the people is all I ever bled for.” Malik assumes that Altaïr is counting him among _your_ , but his sacrifice is ill-received, unwanted, “Seven years of watching others enjoy sex and spoils. My generosity has been boundless. And this is what I get in return.”

Altaïr is coming up a few steps to meet him, and Malik’s eyes fall on a small oil-pourer. Extracted from the kitchen, deposited beside the bed, and in all probability filled with substance which is true to the vessel’s original purpose and intended for purposes not true to the vessel’s function. The sight of this little item probably filled with oil unnerves him. He switches gaze to Altaïr, near and drawing nearer still, the prospect of sex sending cool fingers down his gut until he’s caught in a momentary swoon concealed behind a defensive scowl.

“I expect you to behave like a loyal husband. And you defy me still.” Altaïr accuses. He hovers above him, and Malik is staring at his husband now, into his intricately flecked hazel eyes touched by a bloom of faintest amber. Altaïr’s lashes are thick and dark, like a child’s, and there is nothing child-like in the hardness of his face. Nor in the arousal distorting his visage into a sticky sense of uncleanliness enhanced by the dog-like flatter of nostrils.

“You expect me to be your slave,” Malik hisses in low growl because louder is not necessary, because he’s keeping his anger at bay, until Altaïr unleashes a flood, undeterred by Malik’s lack of interest.

“You will bend to my will, or be punished in the denying of it. My generosity demands correction in the face of such behavior.”

Malik’s grip tightens until it feels like the ceramic handle will crumble under the sheer force of his ripened anger, what Altaïr said he finds the most offensive little speech about extorting one’s abject arrogance. Pride in one stirs pride in another and unlocks something feral until Malik is boiling over with blind rage. His face is tight with mockery as he opens his mouth to hurl words he long yearned to speak.

“You are a _jest_. A husband tolerated because of his ownership of a house I cared for.” Altaïr’s face darkens and Malik’s is misleadingly bold, “You may be bigger and older, but you are _beneath_ me.”

By a very grim and fortunate coincidence, Malik still holds the pitcher in his hand.

What comes next does so devoid of thought and fueled by hot-white-black _anger_. Malik swings the pitcher with a might he didn’t think himself capable of—he doesn’t break the vessel, but lands a heavy conk on Altaïr’s temple and bolts from the spot.

His legs feel weightless, his feet divorced from sensation, but he makes off with a thudding heart and the dull impact the fallen pitcher made at connecting with Altaïr’s head and the pitch of his pained groan echoing in his head like music.

He moves in uncanny speed.

Malik doesn’t need to skid to a halt but slips easily into the first room, and for just one instant, he is captured in a supreme happiness of relief upon sighting the door, a most refined emotion a human hunted can attain, before that relief is snatched away from his grasp.

He hasn’t heard Altaïr. Neither his step nor his voice.

But arms clinch around his waist painfully as Altaïr seizes him and rushes back to bedroom like a child with stolen sweets.

Malik recovers from this savagery with a short delay and manages a single kick to Altaïr’s shin and a misdirected swing of elbow before Altaïr flings him onto bed. He bolts in panic, but in vain—he has scarcely rolled over when Altaïr’s grip shackles his wrists to soft bed, the heavy bulk of the man’s body chains his legs, and he is frozen for a second, an instant perhaps. Then the sheer weight of Altaïr’s lower body on his joined thighs comes as a stab of pain and he parts them to aid relief, attempts a vigorous struggle to throw the man off but feels like pinned to bed with arms nailed down his body and left thigh pinned between Altaïr’s with the man’s knee pushing against his groin in agonizing pressure.

“You will tend to your words with more care in my presence!”

“My words are carefully chosen!”

In some saner world devoid of assault and harassment and curbing of freedom, Malik might have drawn the line at the sudden grotesque sight of this man’s fury. In the calm of another time and place where warriors don’t marry children to abate their hunger for loyalty, Malik would have thought twice before setting a warrior on anger.

In this world, there is something ridiculously wrong in his current position and his ill-chosen struggle which only serves to inflict further pain on his own body. He grits his teeth until his molars start to hurt like raw nerve while the burden of Altaïr’s body mass forcing itself down onto his wrists goes on until Malik feels they could snap like twigs. Despite the folly of struggle he writhes and squirms beneath Altaïr, the final clawing for survival of a dying animal.

Altaïr lays himself out hovering a wisp away from Malik’s torso and he ceases straining and fidgeting.

“I can subdue you with one hand, struggle on and show me your _stupidity_.”

Malik’s body falls into a lax state limp lifelessness.

At this, Altaïr’s face divests itself of ire and dons a new cloak of arousal. He expects Malik to resist at first but progressively accept the pleasures of sex. He anticipates conceited resistance out of principle and then expects Malik to open up to him and accept him between his thighs, to allow Altaïr to sink into the shape of his smaller body and taste the sweetness of his lips while he fucks into him. Altaïr envisions Malik on his back with thighs spread for him. That’s how he wants him. This way or no other. Where he can watch the nuance of pleasure on his husband’s face and gauge arousal on the state of his cock. Altaïr had tried women once, and they divulged nothing of their real pleasure. Men are easier to decipher. If Altaïr can’t see the reflection of his own pleasure in his partner, he finds himself unable to perform. A secret long known and never shared.

Malik doesn’t know the worries that assail Altaïr’s mind, but his hands are still under lock and coveting freedom and he shows deference, receives Altaïr with a greater show of geniality than is necessary—a move of brewing cunning rather than shameful surrender. Altaïr’s eyes are of ravenous appetite and Malik looks to side to escape the discomfort it brings.

Altaïr’s greedy mouth is a mushy inconvenience on his neck.

One to be endured just like the wide-spaced flurry of kisses down the shoulder gap of his sleeping tunic and down his shackled arm. And kisses they are. Malik must name them as such, grudgingly, and as ravenous as they are. It matters little. Further up, the shock lodged in Malik’s head is slowly dispersing. Altaïr unchains his wrists to set eager hands to purpose, to lug off his tunic. Something shrieks in Malik’s body at this state of half-undress and moves his limbs into protest during a flare of courage he is proud of. Altaïr’s lips are below his navel and the hardness of his cock imprinted into Malik’s upper thigh, and so Malik’s movement is unnoticed, unexpected.

He draws his left arm up to chest, below chin, and lands a sinistral, solid elbow hook to the side of head he has abused before—an eager move of self-preservation. Altaïr sways to the side and loses balance for a moment, which is enough for the warrior to fall far behind Malik.

Victory to him who fights the longest.

He moves quickly, shunning fear and bolting for the door again, his sole thought to get away or alarm the community.

The door bangs and he is half-way out shouting for aid, alerting the community his sole way into safety, but a palm slams against his mouth in mid-shout muffling his voice before he is hauled back inside with a shiver of half-terror and half-panic searing through him. They govern his body as he attempts to release the hold Altaïr keeps on his body while dragging him back towards bedroom and it’s pathetically accidental that Malik manages to stomp on his foot and stumble out from slackened grip. Bitter at himself for not having fled a distance away from the door and for having his only escape blocked by Altaïr, he takes cover at the opposite side of the dinner table.

“You would lie with a child ordered to do so!” He bellows across table. These words will keep him safe till a couple moments later, and he cannot think farther than that.

“You’re no child anymore.”

It’s no use, Malik can’t outsmart him into switching positions and they stare at each other like predator and prey before meal, heaving breath.

“No words?” Altaïr mocks.

“Shock seizes my tongue,” he snarls, untruly.

“Then perhaps my cock will aid in untangling it. Seeing as many others did,” Altaïr barks back, standing immune to Malik’s tone.

Malik falls in furious rage.

“No amount of persuasion will save you from jealousy’s grasp, _idiot_.”

“At every step I find insults to your chastity hurled at my face and shoved down my throat!”

And in that instant, Malik knows it’s Altaïr’s sorest spot, the possibility that he may not have been as sexually idle as he claims. A ridiculous notion made more ridiculous by Altaïr’s ludicrous expectation of consensual coupling.

“ _Your_ fault for causing such rumors! You’ve brought shame upon me with your rash acts,” an intent takes form in Malik’s head and he makes hasty preparations to act on it, “Do not press me again with such accusation!”

He starts with anger and his impulse of self-preservation does the rest as he makes a pretentious attempt to fake left and swerve off right. He tries to elude Altaïr by faking path and rushing straight for the door, but finds his attempt halted at once. As suddenly as Altaïr snatches him up and sweeps him off feet, the idea of kneeing him in the crotch crosses mind, but shock drops on him as they tumble onto the bed.

Altaïr doesn’t throw him onto it, for fear of Malik sprinting off this time, and they collapse together, with pained grunts and flailing limbs.

“You are afraid!” Malik hollers, thrashing to free himself from the cage of Altaïr’s arms, “Afraid of what you’ll find because you’ve lived in a dream and you must awaken—“

“ _I know no fear_.” Altaïr falls upon him to thwart movement driving Malik to crazed shouts.

“Your fear is for my chastity, if I remained loyal to an imaginary husband or spread my legs for each man that passed _the_ _street_ —“

In a moment of insanity Altaïr seizes him by the throat, tight. Malik struggles, he is trying. Life seems to be playing another extraordinarily unamusing joke as Altaïr holds fast, forcing back his head and staring down into Malik’s pained face with a feverish snarl, the adult face with a stupid, wrathful face of a child beset by jealousy. Altaïr presses down on him until his head begins to buzz through throes of pain, fingers tighten around his neck until the grip coaxes a choking sound from Malik’s throat.

Death as punishment for nothing.

Malik’s breath is stifled, his vision obstructed by specks of dark. Pain ceases. Malik feels like being slowly put to sleep, and for just one long instant he is captured in an echo of past, a vision perfectly plain in his sight. Altaïr’s hands upon his neck conjure up an image long dead and never forgotten and direct his memory towards the loss of his brother, until tears gather at the corners of eyes and overflow in plump drops spilling down his temples.

In the next moment Altaïr pulls himself off with a rupture of regret on his face, as if blaming his hands alone for this act of violence, removed from his own choice.

“I stopped hurting you. I don’t want to hurt you. Why do you cry?” He sputters out, feeling revulsion at this violence, waits for Malik’s body to recover from the shock.

Malik hides emotion behind closed eyelids and restores breath to body. He creeps down from his agitated state enough to speak, and opens his mouth enough to croak out words, “My brother was choked to death by your men.”

“Don’t trouble yourself with denial,” he adds in hoarse whisper.

“I do not attempt to.”

Malik can’t read minds but from the vulgar debauchery of penitence on Altaïr’s face he assumes that Altaïr will stop with whatever intentions he had harbored before this. He keeps still to discourage trouble, and hopes for a moment peace.

“Brush away your tears. I don’t want to look at them,” Altaïr tells him, “You will have to face away. I don’t wish to look at your tears while I fuck you.”

“ _Fuck_ you!”

Fresh anger boils over inside Malik and rekindles his struggle into new vigor, and Altaïr’s renewed grip on his body doubles. Anger goads him on, but the tussle is brief, resulting in Altaïr’s entire weight sitting atop his thighs and his hands pressing down Malik’s wrists into his lower back. Malik’s wrists begin to ache and the tight grip keeping them imprisoned leaves him little choice but to bend his body and hollow out his back under this onslaught of pain.

Altaïr’s crotch, pressed to his clothed rear as the man holds him down, is making him dismally uncomfortable. Several fruitless attempts of twisting away later, Altaïr stoops down catching the fabric of Malik’s tunic between his teeth and pulling up. So wild and convincing is his pull that the ripping of fabric paralyzes Malik for a moment, long enough for Altaïr to wrap one hand round both his wrists and allow his other to clasp his bared thigh and smooth up his tensed cheek and knead into the plump muscle.

Malik’s resolve oozes away at this immediate threat. He flees the shadows of bravado and gives a whimper of fright.

Altaïr is unskilled in the way of words, but he is aware of body language. Malik’s tells the tale of utter dread. Altaïr has picked up signs long before words leave his husband’s mouth:

“Take pause, I _beg_ of you.”

“You are afraid...” Altaïr realizes with puzzlement, the light of his arousal muted by Malik’s fear. Altaïr has a fear also. Altaïr knows he can’t maintain his erection if his partner is in pain, fear, discomfort. He had hoped Malik’s struggle is born of prideful resistance to the new role in household. He had hoped that Malik will shed pride when persuaded into the pleasure of sex.

Malik lies with belly flattened to bed keeping face away from Altaïr’s sight, wrapped in silence pregnant with suspense. Altaïr releases his wrists but lets his hand glide down the swell of cheeks earning a wince from an already tense body trapped beneath his.

“You flinch like a man never kissed you, caressed your skin, or slipped inside you. Have you been penetrated?”

Malik gives a silent shake of head.

Malik struggles because he isn’t ready.

Altaïr had read the innocence in those features as a lie. He feels guilt for the falsity he had embraced.

“I didn’t believe it true.”

“I yet remain untouched, my chastity preserved.”

“I fear I cannot return in kind,” Altaïr utters with a pang of conscience, “I have tasted carnal pleasures before leaving for war.”

They remain doused in odd silence and Malik turns his neck to gaze at Altaïr, still sitting atop his thighs and immersed in a thoughtful frown.

“Roll onto your side.” Malik tenses at this proposition but Altaïr rushes to ease his mind, “I won’t penetrate you.”

He slinks off, leaving Malik plenty room for escape. Malik is robbed of desire to attempt flight as the word of promise sinks into his weary mind and spent body. Altaïr retrieves his oil-pourer and Malik turns onto his side, facing away from his equally silent husband. Altaïr is a savage brute. But he’s a man of word. Malik is plunged into the unknown while Altaïr is doing whatever he’s doing behind his back, but he lays trust into his promise.

Thoughts won’t visit him even as his mind nags him to dissect Altaïr’s previous claim. He won’t give his mind opportunity for dissection, not before he’s divined Altaïr’s intentions.

He trains his ear for every sound and hears the slick-and-wet drag over skin, short before Altaïr slips his palm between Malik’s joined thighs and kneads rough, oily fingers into the fleshy portion of his inner thigh, near-hairless and silky. He twists his wrist and slicks both equally, and Malik keeps still, stiff, wide-eyed.

From the start it’s too difficult to leave much thought for anything else other than this utterly itchy and sticky feeling. When Altaïr settles behind him and sidles up to his back, the searing warmth of Altaïr’s chest stitches itself to his clothed back, and Altaïr slips his cock between Malik’s slick thighs just like that. His cheeks are on fire and his thighs tense up like a vice, to a point where he realizes that this is enhancing Altaïr’s pleasure, and he turns his muscles lax out of spite.

“Squeeze your legs,” Altaïr says with his lubed shaft wedged between Malik’s thighs, and when he refuses to oblige Altaïr sighs, “I’ll finish sooner if you do.”

Malik does so with a begrudging scowl, sworn to shorten Altaïr’s pleasure where possible, but also to shorten his own torment where doable. It appears that Altaïr takes this as silent permission to slip his arm beneath Malik’s to join them into a farce of an embrace, to roll Malik’s upper body into his own, but Malik growls in hostility and drives him into retreat.

That Altaïr won’t penetrate him reconciles Malik to the husk of Altaïr’s breath growing louder during the succession of thrusting and gripping his hip for purchase. The sensation is made weirder by Altaïr’s randomly-timed touch of lips upon a palette of places—Malik’s nape, ear, shoulder, and crook of neck.

The tufts of fine hair stick damply to Malik’s neck where they’re washed with Altaïr’s moist breath, and his skin burns from the recursive repetition of slow thrusts between the hot flesh of his inner thighs. When Malik set out into the day this morning, he never expected to end it with a man thrusting his lubed penis between his thighs, a sensation turning stranger as Altaïr’s aim begins to climb until his cock settles right below Malik’s crotch, bumping and sliding against his sack with each slow, shallow rock of Altaïr’s hips advancing into his body.

It seems impossible to drive his mind away from this sensation, but Malik attempts to. _I have tasted carnal pleasures before leaving for war_. By implication, this means that Altaïr has not tasted them thereafter. By implication, it means that Altaïr abstained from sex as a gesture honoring the mutually-promised fidelity. By implication, it means that _this_ is Altaïr’s first sexual encounter after seven years of war. That is two firsts. It is also Malik’s first sexual encounter.

The slick slap of Altaïr’s groin moving against his rear and between his slick thighs rouses him from pondering.

It is then when he first comes into contact with arousal caused by another person. Arriving at this point was the thing he had feared all day, a thing he knew would happen to him sooner or later, and it is so utterly and prosaically different now that it happened. He thought it would be simpler, not as extraordinarily complicated. He thought it would be terrible, but his belly is growing hot in sporadic pulses.

Altaïr's parted lips are a breath away from his shoulder and occasionally dipping in to brush against his skin under the pretense of hips movement. Breezy puffs of air prickle his skin driving the fine hairs on his nape to a stand. The heady scent of arousal falls heavy on him during this regular repetition of thrusts. His brain had told him (it was some complicated explanation) that coming anywhere near enjoyment of this is sacrilege, but his body lulls itself into the pull of Altaïr’s body.

Malik glances down his own body to have a look, trying not to upset the position of his neck and draw Altaïr’s attention to this subtle movement. His eyes gaze beyond his own thickening shaft to inspect Altaïr’s length recurrently appearing in his sight after each push. Altaïr’s cock is of impressive size when engorged. His girth is more noticeable than his length, thick enough that Malik can feel it nick into the tendon of his inner thighs whenever Altaïr pressed forward. His balls feel heavy and a handful.

Malik looks away. His body is streaked with arousal and he’s not proud of it.

For one mad moment, he contemplates letting Altaïr have a share in this knowledge, for the simple reason of seeing his reaction.

He measures the pitch of his voice before allowing a sugary soft moan roll from the shallow depths of his mouth, its volume deliberately calculated to appeal to Altaïr's ear.

Altaïr’s response is instantaneous and Malik isn’t sure what draws his attention first—the deep, throaty moan of pleasure-and-surprise that vibrates against the back of his neck, or the abrupt change in the cadence of Altaïr's thrusts. The hand that coils around his waist to pull up his tunic and splay itself fingers-spread atop his belly doesn’t come as surprise.

Malik gives another honeyed sound and receives an inhumanly growl into the crook of his neck.

The implication is plain as day—Altaïr finds sexual pleasure in Malik's arousal.

Altaïr rolls Malik's frame into his chest, plucks him closer, and every thrust in pushes him deeper between Malik's thighs. He brushes his hand up Malik's ribs and towards his chest, thumbing across a pebbled nipple shortly before plunging to take the base of Malik's cock into a convincing grip. There is a groan on Malik's neck, rumbling deep from Altaïr's throat as the man feels his hardness and attempts to encourage Malik into a climax through the seasoned twist and pull of his fist, but Malik doesn't allow for this sudden intimacy.

He shrinks away from Altaïr's hold.

Altaïr wrenches him back as he tries slipping farther away, but he removes his arm when Malik settles into former place. Altaïr grunts abjectly in response to this rejection. His erection is starting to wilt, staying just hard enough to guide him through the impeding orgasm. He doesn't attempt curling his arm around Malik's waist again, but his rough hand is digging into Malik's hip, gripping tighter each time he bucks.

This proves Malik's theory.

Altaïr finds sexual pleasure in his partner's arousal, but Altaïr can't perform if his partner is in pain. It is a great relief to know that Malik has this influential knowledge to fall back on in future. Altaïr will not bother him if he finds him unwilling.

Malik has been underfed pleasure from the start and doesn’t hope for release, but he fights this battle with means available to him, by making this moment of tedium into something bearably enjoyable, and something to extract knowledge from.

His annoyance declares itself too ill to function and he gives in to the greyish shade of reluctantly enjoying the feeling of a strong body moving against his. It is an utterly spineless, brainless condition but strongly supported by his gut that amassed on hot-sweet whirl of arousal he persisted in keeping as far from his cock as physically feasible. After the dam of resistance breaks and arousal starts oozing into his groin, he gives himself to the pleasure of Altaïr’s measured motions and lets his ears listen to the needy wet breath on his damp neck. His body grows lax until Altaïr’s rolling hips tilt his lower body ever so slowly closer to the mattress, after thrust upon thrust, until he can subtly hump into the quilt.

Altaïr's orgasm takes him by surprise. There was nothing to herald it, no groaning, no hint in the regular bucking of his body, nothing except the stuttered breath dragged from his throat during the messy climax.

The grip on Malik's hip begins to hurt enough to draw attention to it, a sensation far overshadowed by the puddle of Altaïr's seed between his slick thighs, pooling briefly and then dripping down the front of Malik's leg. Altaïr allows his body to turn slack and melt into the tenderness of a long-awaited climax.

Malik’s body refuses to remain molded to Altaïr’s, and with a shove of his shoulder he pushes his husband away, barely stifling a noise of disgust at the slop between his thighs soiling his precious quilt. Altaïr rolls onto his back and doesn't move further, as silent and distant as Malik. With a heavy heart Malik picks a less-costly sheet from under the quilt and pulls the hem up to scrape the milky splatter off his thighs with a disgruntled look wrought with loathing. He folds himself into a position to best avoid the soiled patch of his sheet and inches to the edge of the bed, as far away from his husband as physically possible.

He is stiff with lack of movement, his flank sore where the binds of his nightwear dig into his skin. This is not the side he prefers to lie on, but he'd rather face away from Altaïr, if he can help it.

The lamp gives up after a sudden sputter of light and he is plunged into darkness, Altaïr is asleep, or at least mouse-quiet, and Malik is lying in bed, wide awake, staring into the darkness with a feeling which refuses to divulge its name. He is itching for movement but it's hours before he dares venture into shifting his stiff body again.

Malik feels a stranger in his own bed.

He lies in darkness feeling a leash tighten around his neck until he is suffocating from the suddenness of this arrangement.

 


	2. Chapter 2

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> I must tell you a secret.
> 
> Every god in this story represents one of the main characters. The gods are their metaphorical reflections. And here they are:
> 
> Malik = [Nokem](http://the-king-of-novices.tumblr.com/post/104486337526/live-forever-or-die-trying-the-pantheon-1-9) (solved by [the_one_from_the_forest](http://archiveofourown.org/users/the_one_from_the_forest/profile))  
> Kadar = [Hiba](http://the-king-of-novices.tumblr.com/post/105028879746/live-forever-or-die-trying-the-pantheon-3-9) (solved by [the_one_from_the_forest](http://archiveofourown.org/users/the_one_from_the_forest/profile))  
> Altair = [Gdila](http://the-king-of-novices.tumblr.com/post/104486350666/live-forever-or-die-trying-the-pantheon-2-9) (solved by [tanzende-wasserspeier](http://tanzende-wasserspeier.tumblr.com/))  
> Ezio = [Daga](http://the-king-of-novices.tumblr.com/post/105817154146/live-forever-or-die-trying-the-pantheon-4-9) (solved by [Moondreamer](http://archiveofourown.org/users/Moondreamer/pseuds/Moondreamer))  
> Desmond = Zikaron (solved by [westerbroski](http://westerbroski.tumblr.com/))  
> Leonardo = [Ya'ar](http://the-king-of-novices.tumblr.com/post/114871631011/live-forever-or-die-trying-the-pantheon-6-10) (solved by an anon)  
> Lucy = Sheker (solved by [annyfranny](http://annyfranny.tumblr.com/))  
> Claudia = [Masekha](http://the-king-of-novices.tumblr.com/post/106253964456/live-forever-or-die-trying-the-pantheon-5-9) (solved by [westerbroski](http://westerbroski.tumblr.com/))  
> Rauf = Barzel  
> Al Mualim = Ga'ash (solved by [whats-the-bizness-yeaah](http://whats-the-bizness-yeaah.tumblr.com/))

Three things wrench Malik from fickle slumber.

He wakes to the coldness of a nigh-morning chill, the portion of quilt he has managed to annex during the night now entirely in Altaïr’s possession, leaving his body exposed. He wakes to the relentless sting of side-binds of his sleepwear—a shrewd design of Leonardo’s, now the source of pain as Malik is forced to favor the side he doesn’t favor and coerced into lying on the side-binds and their hard knots which dig into his flesh. He wakes to the movement of a body.

He strains his hearing in anticipation, despite the shiver of cold crawling up his skin in gentle goosebumps, and then hears the thief that cheated him of sleep.

Altaïr’s body gives a twitch.

Malik wonders what stirs such a man from dreams.

Something is vexing his sleep—memories of past or spirits of present. Malik has contradictory feelings about this discovery. He feels sorry for Altaïr only as far as his mnemonic empathy extends, because he remembers the months following the Massacre and nights devoid of proper rest and fitful sleep in Leonardo’s bed. But Altaïr has also woken him, has made him a stranger to his home, has made his bed cold and uninviting, and he feels sorrow at having to live in such conditions and delights in Altaïr’s torment. He explores all avenues of reason and finds not one sprout of excuse to wake him.

Malik breathes slow and thinks quick.

The twitch and spasm of limbs stops as Altaïr’s body eases itself into the nightmare and gives way to stillness. Malik breathes the silence. The knots cut into his bones and muscles, the early morning chill creeps across his skin like cold fingers, his body screams for movement and his mind for peace, but he refuses to wrestle a piece of quilt from Altaïr, and sleep won’t visit him. It’s another hour before he has reason to rise from bed.

There is a tale.

Its pages are strewn across the entire island, across their entire city. From temples and fish graveyards, to statues and buildings erected to gods. A tale instilled into a child from early on, until the child knows every corner of it, until all roads are traveled and familiar, until it learns to read the story from the city’s streets and walls. The one tale that Malik used to tell himself when he lost all else that possessed value.

His eyes fall closed to escape the shimmer of light slithering from the chinks in the curtain concealing his secret corner, to lay the canvas out inside his mind and let the myth of creation play out in his mind’s eye. He repeats the tale so that his heart can find a measure of peace.

The story goes that the Mother of all things visible and invisible, the Uncreated, roamed dark worlds in solitude. When She grew weary of her journey, Mother gave birth to many gods, divine and vile alike. The gods roamed the worlds in quest for a place to call home.

The story goes that on her last birth, Mother felt a child in her womb too powerful to leave her body. She split the child into two halves and made them brothers. The gentler, meek half She blessed as [Hiba](http://the-king-of-novices.tumblr.com/post/105028879746/live-forever-or-die-trying-the-pantheon-3-9). The feral, hot-blooded brother She named [Nokem](http://the-king-of-novices.tumblr.com/post/104486337526/live-forever-or-die-trying-the-pantheon-1-9). Then she ceased to exist.

Malik feels something hot steal up his throat and eyes. To avoid spilling tears at the sudden memory of Kadar, he turns his face into the pillow to let the welling wetness soak in. To avoid the memory of himself and Kadar hand-in-hand roaming the city for a hiding place during the Massacre, he thinks of Nokem and Hiba hand-in-hand roaming the dark world until they came upon an island they would call home.

Weary from their journey, Nokem sang sweetly until he lulled himself to sleep, leaving Hiba to explore the island they claimed for themselves.

Hiba loved their home with such fervor that he spent days on beaches toying with the powdery grey sand. Handfuls he kept pouring down his shoulders and arms in game, until the gold from his arms flaked off turning the sands golden, bringing light to the island. Nokem was still in slumber’s grasp when Hiba set out to wander the rest of their home, resolved to heal the greenery withered from cold winds.

What meek Hiba knew less is that this withered greenery was once planted by a god who inhabited the island before them. What the brothers knew less is that they were not first, nor second, nor third.

It was the god of forest who arrived to virgin soil and dressed it in rich flora. [Ya’ar](http://the-king-of-novices.tumblr.com/post/114871631011/live-forever-or-die-trying-the-pantheon-6-10) lived in solitude among his plants, before two gods aligned to contend for the island and drive [Ya’ar](http://the-king-of-novices.tumblr.com/post/114871631011/live-forever-or-die-trying-the-pantheon-6-10) away. Sheker, the dragon goddess of wind and storytelling, at first unleashed her cold winds on [Ya’ar](http://the-king-of-novices.tumblr.com/post/114871631011/live-forever-or-die-trying-the-pantheon-6-10)’s forest until he withered into sleep. There was the third god who would contend for the island—Ga’ash, god of mountains—far more powerful than Sheker, but no equal to brothers Nokem and Hiba. This vile alliance of wind and mountain could not drive [Ya’ar](http://the-king-of-novices.tumblr.com/post/114871631011/live-forever-or-die-trying-the-pantheon-6-10) away, but it put him to hiding in deep sleep and deep caverns, with patches of withered greenery left behind to reflect his weak powers.

Ga’ash then seated himself as a vast, dark mountain on the southernmost tip of the island, and Sheker traversed the sky watching the brothers. To kill them their sole intent. Sheker was cunning but so was Ga’ash, and he knew that killing the brothers separately was his only chance at rising victorious. Ga’ash instructed Sheker to lure gentle Hiba into his trap by sending sad, weeping winds at his path.

Wandering around, Hiba heard these deceptive cries and mistook them for lament for a lost one and followed this forlorn sound to console the mourning god. Instead, Hiba wandered into the trap and found death when Ga’ash swallowed him into the rock of his sheer mass making the mountain Hiba’s grave. Ga’ash killed Hiba. Interred his body into his mountain, into the cold stone, not the earth Hiba was native to.

The god of mountains stole one of Hiba’s golden eyes in hope that once the battle between him and Nokem started, Nokem would look into his brother’s eye and wouldn’t find strength in his heart to strike Ga’ash down—

Malik opens his eyes with a pulse of shock and the story shatters.

He feels the clammy pang of warmth as Altaïr scoots up to him.

There is not a thread of quilt between Altaïr’s bared torso and his clothed back, and Altaïr’s body is searing hot against his cold one, Altaïr’s breath is warm on his neck, his arm folding around Malik’s waist as if he had every right to do so. Malik’s body is turning hot and his head hotter. There is a split moment while he wills himself to remain still, only to see how far Altaïr’s touching will extend.

Altaïr sidles up to line himself down the entire length of Malik’s smaller body. He cocoons them both into the warm wrapping of the quilt and his face presses into the icy nudity of Malik’s neck, his lips fasten onto this or that patch of skin before stomping onto the next. There is a slow, wispy upcrawl of hand climbing up his chest before the arm settles around Malik’s frame with utmost care and it dawns on Malik that Altaïr thinks him asleep. His husband intended to cheat himself into his dream of domesticity. Leonardo had warned him that Altaïr would want to feel another body near him, to hold Malik close and listen to his pulse and breathing, through deceit if not through consent. The nest of warmth Altaïr has created is of no avail against the branching chill creeping up his ribs from both sides of his frozen spine.

Malik doesn’t leave the bed as much as leaps from it.

He rams his elbow into Altaïr’s flank and breaks from the lock, and allows his husband’s pained groan to escort him out of bed before he turns to snarl insults at this affection:

“Keep your _filthy_ paws off me!”

Malik’s eyes sting but he can’t close them against the satisfying look of stupefaction on Altaïr’s face, even as he still reels from the shock of this bodily proximity.

Altaïr wears the look of amazement well. He keeps still, frozen, stung into silence by Malik’s tantrum, and watches Malik soothe himself through prayer. Malik skips across the puddle of water spilled from the pitcher he had used to bash against Altaïr’s skull last night, and falls into cross-legged sitting before Nokem, bending neck and lifting his cupped palms up for prayer.

Altaïr stares.

Malik won’t answer his advances. Even when they are untainted by sexual craving. It is the first and only defeat Altaïr has suffered in the seven years of battle. Seven years of war to return to war in house. His husband will continue disobedience and show his resentment by a much more domestic warfare.

Malik’s prayer is methodical and the soundless words he whispers to Nokem carefully chosen, but his face plunged into reverence and his head bent in worship. It’s all Altaïr craves. Malik’s undivided admiration drives him to jealousy—an evil designer, destroyer of minds—and he dares the risk of interrupting the sanctity of prayer in this fever of envy.

“I’ve never cared for surprises. But your disobedience is a surprise that brings much disappointment.”

Malik’s eyes open without a rush, his gaze climbs up until he’s looking directly into Nokem’s calm face, but it’s another moment before his hands fall into his lap, his prayer expired.

“Disappointment can only come from expectation. You expected the impossible.”

Altaïr sets himself to solving this dreary riddle but Malik rises and Altaïr’s craving for a husband wins the race against angry jealousy, and he is speaking before he can stop himself.

“The way you bow your head in deference before Nokem... Would I be afforded such generosity?”

Malik turns sideways to look at him.

His dark gaze is quiet, devoid of anger, but it heralds no illusions and Altaïr swallows the bitter taste of impeding rejection which is bound to happen.

“You would. When you become a god.”

Malik picks the pitcher up.

He confiscates the entire bed quilt with a mere yank leaving Altaïr exposed and hurls it across floor to soak up the water. He leaves dragging the quilt along across floor. It’s long before Altaïr brings himself to break the shackle of disappointment and to leave the bed.

 

* * *

 

After Altaïr’s appetite for solitude in home diminishes and his appetite for food starts to swell, he decides to amble down the two stories and ease himself into the hub of life in the community courtyard carrying simple breakfast on a silver plate, the only one he could find in the kitchen.

No one is sitting on the massive table except for a wicker basket, and the table’s lonesome state within this tumult of activity suits him.

Except that the basket gives a delighted squeal and Altaïr drops his gaze to find it a bassinet instead. He shifts a sliver to the right along the bench and peeks into it to find a plump, roundish face of an infant staring quietly up from the wicker bassinet. The infant drifts into quietude with a wistful, guiltless face looking up and away at the sky. Altaïr leaves it alone short of any disturbance and settles on the bench to have meal and to survey the courtyard.

He is a new stranger to his old community, and observing before participating might smooth his approach, re-learning old lessons might remind him of how to fit back into something he had grown out of but missed dearly.

He sets the cup of wine aside and puts a dot of butter on a piece of bread roll, and needs nothing besides.

He chews slowly but his eyes are quick to take in the heart of the community.

Malik’s uninterrupted washing of the bed quilt naturally draws his attention first but he strays from watching his husband work to wander ahead the water well. The other half of the courtyard is dominated by the shadowy sprawl of a plump tree, still in leaf and casting a lacework of shades across stony paving slabs on one half and a square garden plot on the other.

On the paved surface, children of varying ages are contesting for the seat on the sturdy swing hanging from a heavy branch. On the gardening plot stretching out on the other side of the tree, the young mother of the infant to Altaïr’s right is weeding the community garden, planting more herbs. Altaïr chews on the buttery piece of bread and steeps his mind into memory to recall her name. The name Mary surges to the front of his thoughts, her wife’s name, and it takes him another moment to connect her visage to _Anne_. Anne and Mary. The jolly and the grim one.

A shrill laughter tugs him from memory’s grasp and pushes his gaze to his left and across the expanse of pavement stretching between the table and the showers.

Inside the pillared circle of showers, a couple of youths are having a shouting contest with a matching number peering down from the second story to engage in whatever kind of taunting youth thirsts for in that age. Altaïr doesn’t follow this particular jest but his eyes linger long enough to frown at the carelessness with which the nude boy and girl are hurling handfuls of water at the ducking pair above, and they linger longer to see if any of them will slip on the wet tiles.

The tiled floor circle sunken two steps into the ground does not range far in diameter, it’s a compact space enclosed with as many plump columns as there are shower-heads—provided with water by the circular aqueduct sitting atop the winding columns. A compact circle still under the furious spray of two running nozzles and slick soapy rivulets coursing down the gentle slope inwards which encourages water into the drain in the center of the tiled circle. Compact enough to slip on the slick surface and crack skull upon fall, a probability that seems to escape the two frolicking youths who interrupted showering to favor momentary carelessness. Altaïr’s scowl unknots as he remembers that Malik is not far from this age. The thought to ask him if he too falls into such carelessness while showering dangles from his mind, but the pair in the shower-circle settles down at last and, for a split moment, Altaïr’s question turns to questioning himself. No one else seems to be watching the bathing youths. Perhaps it is he who needs to bump his concerns down and adjust to the carefree mood of the society instead of expecting adjustment to his own whims. _Perhaps_ rests in his mouth until the bite of bread turns mushy and he swallows it together with the word.

And then, there is another shrill cry, far closer to him—he jerks his head sideways and his ears immediately pounce on the shrieking little thing with flailing limbs which managed to escape the prison of swathe. Altaïr’s face is carved with a concern-or-affront and he stares at this deafening, trashing display as if he never laid eyes upon a wailing babe before.

There are voices around him and maybe they expect something from him as the cries screech comically against Altaïr’s silence, but he doesn’t remove his scandalized gaze from the flailing bundle, not until this bundle is taken up into gloved arms and pressed to his husband’s chest with practiced care.

There is something profoundly captivating in Malik’s shushing coo and the swollen gentleness of his voice as he stands across the table swiveling in a gentle sway and soothing the fussing infant through this rhythmic motion of swinging until all that remains witness to the former sudden outburst are the baby’s cheeks suffused with a rosy glow.

Malik seats himself across Altaïr with infant in arm and tightens the swaddle leaving one stubborn little hand to roam free, and on his solemn face is a thick tenderness, but his silvery voice is what extends across the table and Altaïr is enveloped into the shroud of his soothing song.

Altaïr’s heart twists at the sight.

A small girl, a wisp of a child barely fourteen, swings the curtain of hanging plants aside as she bursts from a shadowy bench bearing her cithara, and she shuffles up the bench towards Malik to give his voice musical embellishment.

She keeps her right elbow outward and small hand bent inwards picking the strings in tune with Malik’s lullaby and damping the undesired strings with the fingers of her left hand. The plump, bitty fingers of the infant’s free hand clasp around Malik’s little finger and give a tug and Malik smiles through the song and pecks the tip of his index finger against the perky little nose earning a heart-warming coo in return.

The joined spin of the cithara and Malik’s soft lullaby draw others and then there is suddenly the girl from the shower throwing a folded cloth across the bench to sit at Malik’s right with her nude body dripping with water, and a moment later her companion joins seating himself beside equally nude, equally wet, and Altaïr has no time to be troubled by their joined soaking the table wet because this display of youth absorbed in a baby is informing him about _his_ cultural faux pas.

On one side of the table is the community. On the other side is Altaïr.

A child is not raised by parents. A child is raised by the community.

The lost-and-regained memory of this sinks in while the tip of Malik’s gloved finger traces along the smooth outlines of the tiny crochet cap where a few downy tufts of sandy hair are sticking out, while blue blinking eyes regard Malik as he sings in a tender voice. His lullaby is beginning to wane in volume and the tiny hand around his finger gives a twitch but doesn’t tug anymore, and Altaïr is feeling less and less of a community member until he feels entirely useless, until the feeling of not belonging chews him out as he did with his humble breakfast.

Anne is suddenly there, beautiful and good-natured, with hands clean of earth and red hair pulled up and a sculpted look of satisfaction on face as Malik eases the infant into her arms.

She takes him away and this impromptu gathering flutters off the table, and Malik and Altaïr sit alone facing each other.

Altaïr is gazing into his husband’s face, devoid of the generous tenderness that sat there a moment ago, with a clear and somber look. Altaïr struggles to contain his curiosity and he doesn’t know _so many_ things he wants to know—he doesn’t know that the infant is not indoors because Mary is a night guard and Anne allows her to sleep through mornings after return, he doesn’t know that Malik has soothed a handful other toddlers thus, he doesn’t know that Anne is taking the child away to sleep indoors because Mary has awakened— Altaïr was removed from the community for too long to fit back in seamlessly. He did not even know that his husband can sing.

“You were blessed by Nokem.” Altaïr says. It’s a question and statement at once.

Malik nods in a certain way that is humble. He is a child of Nokem. The gift of singing befits him. Altaïr is enslaved into a fantasy, a small and shriveling one, that Malik might one day grow used enough to him to dedicate song to Altaïr’s pleasure, possibly, maybe, perhaps. But this wishful fantasy is dispersed with the yell of Malik’s name that erupts from the staircase on the other end of the courtyard, and Malik faces away from Altaïr to swirl around and his gaze has no sooner touched the figure when he jumps off the bench and carries himself across the courtyard to meet Mary’s demand leaving Altaïr in heavier solitude than he was in as he first seated himself there.

Mary stands an austere character of the community, her severe gaze fixed past Malik, on the point where Altaïr sits, her elbow pressing down the throat of [Gdila](http://the-king-of-novices.tumblr.com/post/104486350666/live-forever-or-die-trying-the-pantheon-2-9)’s statue flanking the staircase to the first floor.

Malik comes up the steps to meet her and shuffles up before her looking up and awaiting word, finding in her eye a sleep-blurred annoyance wrinkled beneath velvet eyebrows. Her hair is down and her braid resting lax down her tensing cheek.

When Mary shifts eyes to look down at him her resentment scatters but Malik has no doubts she would draw sword at Altaïr, should Malik voice desire.

“Did he force himself on you?” She inquires in straight voice searching his body for signs of abuse and Malik is coming to recognize the power of his imminent decision. At present he wishes no harm upon his husband. He looks her in the eye to prepare his voice for sincerity despite of what he truly means. Mary can’t sift through lies with the talent Leonardo is possessed of and relies on people to be frank with her, but even she can pick apart a blatant lie from truth.

“He did not.” He says plainly, without inflection, refusing her offer at revenge. Mary dips her head into a meaningful nod. The lie saved a lot of trouble. She doesn’t hunt his face for lie and trusts his word.

“If he attempts, I will take his life.” Mary states simply.

Malik harbors no doubt that she will. His body thrums with the elation at this protection he can count on, and he knows her raw skill and her ferocity that matches his own. Mary has been his first teacher in the art of sword. The richness of his own skill is owed to both her and Rauf.

A side of Mary’s face pulls up into a smirk, sleek and incorrupt, and the scar falling down her brow and cheek scrunches up, the expression on her face a temper-consuming familiarity that robs Malik of gloom and prompts him to return this gesture in kind. She reaches out and fits her hand against the side of Malik’s face, thumbs briefly over his temple and gives a soft tug at the fleshy part of his earlobe, an old gesture of affection.

Her eyes flit back up to Altaïr sitting alone in the distance before she takes off to follow Anne back into their home.

Her words are uplifting, but Malik fans himself off this good humor as early as he turns around to see two armed warriors strolling through the tunnel and into the courtyard, chattering with a clutch of elderly women as they went. One of them he recognizes as a noble, and both of them he recognizes as his husband’s friends, if such a thing existed.

Seeing the noble causes Malik fierce pain.

He locks this crushing disappointment away, and slithers up to his abandoned spot on the water well to wring his salvaged quilt out and collect it into his pail.

On the table, Altaïr is whisking away the crumbs to properly welcome them into the community he does or does not belong to, and the two men fit themselves on Altaïr’s sides each, taking helmets off.

“Forgive such disturbance at an unreasonable hour.” Desmond jests and Altaïr is all too eager to fall into a familiarity to escape the burden of not belonging. It was a sudden quest for _fitting in_ which changed its object only after he attained it through their presence, forgetting midway that he poorly attended the rest of his meal which gave Desmond and Ezio license to annex it, splitting it equally among themselves as they did so.

Desmond scrapes the cup away under Altaïr’s nose and drains it without once stopping to question its contents, which makes his discovery all the sweeter as he finds wine and sets the leftover of his impromptu conquest back before Altaïr. Everything in warfare is a form of conquest. From a sleeping place in the tent to the larger portion of bread. Altaïr is torn between labeling this behavior as still living in war or trying to cushion the abrupt landing into society through some familiarity, pitiless as it is. Desmond rambles his elbows up onto the table and sets his forearms onto it with a wide, fattish smirk on his mouth and a knowing gleam in his eye, and Altaïr suspects the latter is the answer.

“You took my wine?” Altaïr says.

“Borrowed it. I’ll piss it all back to you.”

Altaïr’s amusement fits perfectly into his scowl and Desmond is quick to seize his good spirits with a good-natured bump into shoulder, unwittingly providing Ezio plenty opportunity to gobble up the rest of Altaïr’s breakfast.

“I’m half-starved and half-drunk.”

“You’re always half-drunk.” Altaïr says, but he doesn’t allow reproach to seep into his tone even as he remembers an instance of having to remove Desmond from battlefield and tie him away inside camp, less for injury and more for the aftermaths of a drunken bout from last night. Desmond enjoys the pleasures of occasional drink, a vice neither Altaïr nor Ezio are innocent of.

“Half-drunk and half-sober.” Desmond insists, and Altaïr knows there’s nothing intoxicated about him this morning even if Desmond is trying to keep up a reputation.

His wine is drained but his last loaf of bread is still there, or so Altaïr hopes until the barren state of his plate presents itself to him as he turns to Ezio who is already traversing Altaïr’s community in what is probably a quest for sexual conquest.

“How do I go on with my meal now?”

Ezio stops his half-hearted pursuit to share a look with innocence asprawl on his face, “I didn’t know you haven’t finished meal.”

“What did I tell you when asked me?”

Ezio pops a quick scowl puzzled at Altaïr’s question.

“I didn’t ask you—Oh.”

Altaïr heaves a sigh and catches glimpse of Malik making his way past them with his pail in hand, and he stages what is the worst disaster of this morning.

“Malik!” He calls out, “Fetch us some wine.”

The bundle of laughs sits there expecting to be attended and Malik stands there like a fuddled fly between muslin and pane, like he is going to be sick by just looking at them.

“Get off your ass and fetch it _yourself_.” He snarls, insistent to reduce Altaïr to a figure of fun before his revered company, “I’m not your pet, running to heel when leash is chucked.”

Instead of desired impact, his words give rise to laughter, and even if there is difference between Desmond’s and Ezio’s laugh, Malik can’t bother to take them apart from the sheer indignation that bloats him up until he snarls at them too.

“Your pup bares his teeth, Altaïr.” Ezio baits, and on his face is a smug pleasure at having a sting at Malik’s misfortune, “Barely away from his mother’s tit, and still carries himself like a bratty child.”

“And who are you? Aside from being a dirty warrior?”

“I am Ezio Auditore. Of the last families to survive the Massacre.”

“Pleasure to make fucking acquaintance.” Malik grits out at the upward jerk of Ezio’s chin, steeped far in pride, and stomps up the stairs to remove himself from this sorry lot.

“Praise laid upon your husband has not been exaggerated.” Desmond teases Altaïr. Yet he doesn’t host satisfaction at Malik’s misfortune as Ezio does.

“You jest while my house falls to crumble...”

Altaïr then falls oddly silent, quick in putting a shroud on the stupidity of his wrong choice. Ezio is quiet but not repentant, and Desmond can’t stand to watch Altaïr’s hands splayed out on table collecting crumbs to keep his otherwise idle hands busy during this silence.

Altaïr’s gaze does follow after Desmond as he rises and scampers up stairs following the path Malik has walked.

Desmond finds the door closed but unlocked. He peeks inside before he allows himself in, and immediately to the right in what looks like a cozy kitchen is Malik assembling food on a simple plate, and judging by the quantity of it, it’s Malik’s own breakfast.

Desmond leans casually into the pillar of wall and tilts his head to the side. Malik doesn’t look smothered by his presence but sufficiently put out to offer him a dark look.

“I would caution softer words towards your husband, Malik.” Desmond says, his tone wholly consistent with the gentle smile resting on his lips. There is no joke, no jest, no taunt.

“Who are you to lecture me?” Malik inquires, keeping his voice surprisingly civil and calm, and his question is immersed in genuine curiosity. Desmond’s presence doesn’t fester like Ezio’s.

Desmond toys with the ribbed rim of the wall dragging the tip of his finger up-and-down, pleased that Malik narrowed his hatred to Ezio only and gave him room for talk.

“My relations to you are unfettered by darkness of the past as Ezio’s are. But they are burdened with wish for my friend’s happiness.” He lays it out on the table without sugarcoating and hopes that Malik will accept this less sugary offer. “I’m not your friend. But I would like to be, despite my allegiances to Altaïr. And my advice is for the benefit of you both.” He hurries to add.

Malik’s response is delayed.

Desmond catches his thumb pressing down a round roll of bread, more in order to fill the silence with motion than to test its softness, and otherwise all is quiet. Desmond lets him think and falls into watching the food, deeply regretting having skipped meal at Ezio’s insistence, and then he speaks to hasten Malik’s decision.

“I can start by earning your trust.”

Malik looks up and for a brief moment catches Desmond eyeing the food and there is a shadow of a smile on Malik’s lips.

“If you can make Altaïr not touch me for a start...” He trails on. He cuts out a chunk of cheese and slots it onto the plate, pulls out a smooth bowl with a bright burnish and loads it with tender meat, and before Desmond can register what he’s intended, Malik is pushing the dishes and a basket of loaves across the counter and towards him, “Here’s food. Maybe you’ll appreciate it better than my husband.”

Desmond accepts his generosity but scowls before inspecting the food, and finding that only meat could come remotely close to deviation from the norm, he peels off a strip for a sampling. Three chews are enough to reveal the source of Altaïr’s discontent and Malik’s ignorance.

“Ah, about that,” a chuckle escapes him as he takes to picking the dishes up, “Bland warrior food is to blame. There’s sufficient spice in here to put him off. Others used to sneak out from time to time to pilfer spices from commander camps, but not Altaïr. He’s a stickler for discipline.”

“Order and obedience. That’s all he cares about, isn’t it?” Malik brushes this information off, an otiose, useless gesture to keep thoughts off his own folly and unintentional disregard for a warrior’s palate, and off his own failure to recognize the reason for Altaïr’s pickiness.

Desmond smirks in a way that is distracting and filling Malik’s head with thoughts of Altaïr, and he has nowhere to run from them.

“Not all.”

Malik stares at him in wonder, even as the spot turns vacant and Desmond slithers off, and he ponders whether he alone is responsible for his own anger yesterday.

By the time he revisits the courtyard, the warrior trio at the table is doting on their helmets and combing their long tails in solemn silence.

 

* * *

 

 

What happens on the temple forum later that day happens in an massive, excited rush.

It happens in a sudden wave that sweeps the city and drifts them all ashore before the colossal temple to [Gdila](http://the-king-of-novices.tumblr.com/post/104486350666/live-forever-or-die-trying-the-pantheon-2-9) where they stand spilling out from the grounds of the forum teeming with people, they encircle the entire temple complex, they crawl up the first block of stairs in dozens to accommodate the growing mass of flocking people and to stare up at the man who gave motive for the Massacre seven years ago, the man who led their warriors into seven years of war and returned triumphant.

Al Mualim raises his hands and the city falls silent thirsting for his words.

Malik’s wrath is boundless. He stands among the swarm of people with a rare fury, so potent that even Altaïr’s hand on his shoulder alleviates it to some extent. Altaïr’s hand allows itself lower and settles on his back during this commotion and the warrior plays his part as husband admirably—as for the touch, it is ignored. This blend of warriors and citizens cannot be fortuitous, Malik imagines it is a deliberate intent orchestrated by Al Mualim for whom the crowd morphs into uncanny silence.

“As a young man, I defended the City of Nine. As an old man, I shall not abandon it.”

Al Mualim commences his grandiloquent speech, his words as hollow as his good intentions. Malik listens to the murderer while he tangles the citizens in a net of lies, but knows that denigrating his enemy does not add to his own glory. He acknowledges Al Mualim’s power, his cunning. He is passionate and stirs the same in others. Appearance—appearance is everything. Malik is frightened for what this man and his speech might lead to, but it’s a cog already set into motion and he tries to tell himself it’s not too late, but Al Mualim continues with his empty words and Malik holds mute with Altaïr’s hand on his back: one against an admiring crowd, one who is not blinded, and what can one man do so far-removed from enemy.

“—this is Gdila’s plan for human happiness and order, and it is our duty to provide order and those who defy it are rebels: not against us, but against _Gdila_ —”

The gathered city erupts into rupture even before Al Mualim’s sentence meets its end.

Malik, too, is cornered into staring at the sight with awe as an eagle bursts from the skies during Al Mualim’s speech, a majestic creature equaling Gdila himself, and flies across the crowd and is seen descending somewhere inside the city. Malik’s awe swaps place with fear, not because of this divine sign, but because of the pure chimes of excitement around him, the overlapping echoes of joy, and the piping cries of reverence as people turn heads back to Al Mualim, a man frozen in this divine approval. Malik refuses to believe that gods would sanction Al Mualim as the patron of the city, the very notion is an affront to justice, but Malik feels it in the beaming crowd—the sentiment that slithers between the people and into their hearts, their eyes. Due to no fault of their own, people are starting to see Al Mualim as more than just a ruler—they are starting to see him as a god.

Before long, people will be erecting temples to Al Mualim and worshiping him as a savior.

Malik is so lost to the horror of this possibility, this imminent reality, that he scarcely feels as Altaïr’s protective hand leaves his back, as a body squeezing through behind them now comes forward between Altaïr and Desmond and whispers to Altaïr that Al Mualim is hosting a dinner in honor of gods and wishes for Altaïr’s presence, that of his family (his only theoretical family being Malik), and that of his most trusted comrades.

Altaïr is too honored to offer more than a nod in reply.

The men he trusts are already at his side.

 

* * *

 

 

 It feels like the three warriors and Malik are the only outsiders invited.

Their entrance into the property is uneventful, except for the brief spat between Altaïr and a guard whose search for weapons (a security measure that unjustly only Malik had to suffer, the excuse given that he is a civilian) morphed into something little less than feeling Malik up during this patting down, and the shortness of Malik’s tunic in present circumstance is setting Altaïr off. Malik is offended enough at this unjust pat down and this blatant groping, but amused enough to ignore it for the irrational anger it causes Altaïr.

As they enter, it is through a large front-chamber tapering into a massive hallway leading into a colossal atrium. 

Malik goes some distance through the hallway flanked by long, extensive drapery, but finds the trio lagging behind (Desmond and Altaïr specifically, with Ezio preferring their company over Malik’s) as they take in the surroundings. The kind of environment Malik was brought up in until the age of ten. To his eyes it is squalid and boring compared to his snug community courtyard, while to them, perhaps with the exception of Ezio who is a noble, everything must seem extraordinarily complicated and lavish and something they are not supposed to taint with their presence. Malik is annoyed by their admiration, and sickened at the _loweness_ and the moral poverty of this place.

As they permit themselves through the occasionally vacant hallway into the atrium, they sight the swarm of people inside circling in a lazy, sluggish movement around the impluvium—a marble square sunken into the center of the atrium and filled with water—circling around the long tables flanking all four sides of it, with lavish, sumptuous amounts of food which is little more than poison to Malik’s eyes. Many of these people are foreigners he never before set eye upon, but he is inclined to resent them for the company they share.

The four of them stand unsure for a few moments.

They have not even been given a proper chance to merge into this gathering before Al Mualim is there to halt their attempt, less for intention of welcoming them into the company of this noble-and-vile gathering, and more to announce reasons for their required presence here.

Al Mualim is there, before him, two steps distant, and Malik falls into his furious rage at the mere existence of this man, at his proximity and his scarred visage. The warriors around Malik are silent from respect, and Malik is silent from fury. He can almost sense the worry off Altaïr, his urge to pull Malik’s arms back and shackle his wrists to keep him in place like nothing but a rabid dog short of vaulting at the man Altaïr calls master. But Malik doesn’t jump after Al Mualim’s throat, he is not an animal, he is not without brains, and he seethes through his gaze but keeps his tongue locked behind teeth.

Until Al Mualim speaks and the cacophony of conversation ceases and Malik’s tongue is given free reign by none other than Al Mualim himself.

“Brave warriors follow their old master. Would citizens follow their new one?” His question is for Malik but loud enough to indicate that its answer is intended for everyone in the room, and for those who aren’t, “Is there hope for joined loyalties, or will the city once more be torn asunder between split allegiances?”

Al Mualim’s eye fastens to Malik, a child whose family he ordered dead, a child whose home he ordered burned to ground, a child whose marriage to a man ten years older he sanctioned.

Around them is silence.

Malik got a chance he hasn’t asked for and he pounces on it, and Altaïr can see it out of the corner of his eye, he can sense that something essentially bad is coming, he knows that Malik resents them all but hopes that his resentment has no teeth, that he can only watch and let his hatred brew inside him. But Malik props his chin up and opens his mouth and it’s too late.

“A sad day when the city elevates a cur to such position.” Malik says with all stature of a born noble, with a complicated meanness, as if words could do something, and they could do a whole lot.

Altaïr’s stomach flips with terror and he turns white as chalk. He can almost sense Malik’s sour reveling in the shame his words provided Altaïr, but his thoughts are focused on how this gross insult to his master will be received.

There are generally three possible outcomes of Malik’s foolishly daring slur. Malik could be punished, Malik and Altaïr could be punished, or Al Mualim could choose to take the insult with a pinch of salt. And then, as Al Mualim says nothing but wordlessly beckons Altaïr to follow him instead, Altaïr hopes it is the third and suddenly seizes Malik’s hand and gives it a grip that almost breaks his bones, but Malik looks up eagerly, fearlessly, and Altaïr knows two things—that Malik will chalk up whatever he says as bosh, and that he has no time to fight across purposes with Malik while Al Mualim is waiting.

He tugs Malik into Desmond’s hand to leave him in his care, “He must be distracted, lest he falls to ill temper. I won’t have his tongue flap about absent direction.” Altaïr instructs Desmond in a rush trusting his comrade to keep his husband in line, and he starts after Al Mualim in haste, pointedly ignoring the curse that Malik spits after him.

 Malik feels himself being guided away while he stares in anger after his retreating husband, and by the time Desmond has maneuvered them towards one of the tables, Ezio has disappeared off into the crowd, and Malik isn’t clinging to Desmond’s presence as Desmond is clinging to Malik’s. Desmond has not before been among such company, and although he wears the standard armor of a warrior—no different than Ezio’s and Altaïr’s—he feels conspicuous and Malik’s presence tones down this feeling of outlandishness in the midst of these people.

He’s led them to a table, but Malik’s thoughts cling no more to the food than to Desmond’s attempts to easier immerse himself into his surroundings. He applies himself to different thoughts and he has a sudden, urgent need for a knife, a blade of any kind. A blade he could discreetly steal, nothing like Desmond’s large sword or a weapon easily spotted. He _must_ find it.

Desmond nibbles onto whatever he has nipped from the table while Malik’s eyes skim over the lavish display he has no appetite for, in search of a weapon of justice. He suffers a brief torment of indecision until he decides his goal is feasible. He only needs a blade. And he finds one. One. It’s sticky, with crumbs of dough clinging to the tacky blade coated in something that looks like honey, but it is a blade, and that’s all that matters.

He glances up at Desmond and both of them are feeling a damp dizzy warmth, for very different reasons.

Malik follows the path Desmond’s gaze is taking and finds at its end a woman, across the impluvium of water, behind the table on the other side of the room. Malik thinks he has never seen a skin so evenly pale dressed in darkest crimson—there is a pale-faced woman with a painted lip and smooth blonde hair, and an air of authority whirling around her in dizzying maelstrom.

She has a funny manner of looking at people intently—not into eyes though, but into the face, as if everyone has a story lodged deep inside them which she would tear out and extract. She could turn a man into a sentimental pup. Desmond peeks at her in a look which couldn’t reveal to Malik if Desmond is imagining making love to that woman or weighing whether he is worthy enough of approaching her. Malik decides to prod, for curiosity’s sake, and for the sake of selfishly clearing his path towards acquiring that sticky blade used for cutting cake.

“Desmond. That woman is looking at you.” Malik says in a hushed, sly tone, and Desmond drops his furtive gaze down to look at him. He looks puzzled, as if unaware of there being any woman in the room. Malik doesn’t desist and Desmond lifts his veil of mock confusion, and huffs a smile which is no humor and all self-doubt.

“She’s probably a noble.”

“And so?”

“She is a child of Nokem. I’m a child of Nokem and Gdila.”

Malik delves into the sad joke of Desmond’s words, the sentiment of one man shared by many. Most of the island are now children of Nokem and Gdila. The nobles—those that survived the Massacre like Malik, and those that were not involved in it like Ezio’s family—remain a handful. The number could not round up even to a hundred living nobles. And yet, the non-nobles, the commoners, still hold them in high esteem, even after the warriors slaughtered most of their kind, interred them into a pit on the flat top of the volcano, inside an unmarked mass grave like common cattle. Malik cannot remember his kind ever placing themselves above others. It is the commoners who lower themselves before nobles on their own. That is how deeply-wedged their reverence for Nokem and his children is in their hearts. So deeply ingrained in their conscience that they regard themselves as the lower echelon of society and consider themselves unable to mingle with Nokem’s pure-bred children. A notion which is the very affront to Malik’s own marriage.

“I am noble. And my husband is not.” Malik states gravely, trying to inspire Desmond’s confidence and further his self-esteem. His words seem to give him some courage. Desmond is far from despairing but not excessively confident about approaching the woman. It’s been some time into the conversation between his husband and Al Mualim, and Malik hopes that Desmond will take action. He won’t have opportunity to steal the blade and make preparations for assassination if Altaïr returns to put him on a leash and stall his plans.

Desmond reviews the situation. He might have to salvage his ego in near future, but his anticipation is becoming intolerable and he instructs Malik to stay put, and slithers off to present himself to the woman in crimson.

Malik doesn’t smile in triumph but he is near it. He reconnoiters the people nearest to the table and finds no one looking at him, but he must assume that someone might look. He reaches for the blade, seizes it, feels its weight before he cuts into the cake, to test its sharpness. He puts the blade nigh the edge with the handle off the table. He is half-way into extracting the slice of cake when the knife falls victim to gravitational pull and trips over, the clutter of steel against stone drowned by the hum of noise around.

Malik bends at knees and plucks it noiselessly from the floor.

The risk bore fruit.

 

* * *

 

 

Altaïr hastens step and slips into a dark hallway long enough that they pass several chambers and enter the last one before the hallway branches left and right. The room is cold and empty, or so Altaïr thinks until a person walks its presence into the solitary chamber, barely sparing him a glance. The man is of light skin, above average in stature, and bald. This stout, important-looking man, obviously a foreigner, exchanges two-three words with Al Mualim and leaves after a few moments, passing Altaïr only a momentary glance on his way out.

Altaïr awaits orders or thoughts in silence and Al Mualim turns to give them voice.

“This evening truly extols the virtues of your husband, Altaïr.”

Through the cavities of these words crawls some air of humor and Altaïr latches onto this little jab with gratefulness. He is thankful that Al Mualim is taking it with a light heart, and this buoys him up into offering an explanation, even as the thought of entangling his master into the intricate net of his domestic difficulties appears absurd to him, like something a man of position would not be interested in, nor should a man of his own position be encouraged to bother his superior with such twaddle.

“I lacked time to properly tame him, Master. I move towards improving my lot.”

Al Mualim replies with a simple nod without harping on the subject.

“My ears burn with whispers of lawlessness as of late.” Al Mualim says in a brooding, pensive voice. Altaïr is less concerned with deciphering whether he is asked a question or providing audience for Al Mualim’s contemplation. Altaïr is concerned with the troubling implication of this sentence.

“Apologies, Master,” Altaïr starts, unsure, but his concern is genuine, “I was not familiar with the notion of _law_ in our community.”

Al Mualim turns to him after having kept his back to Altaïr for a short time, as if the very question Altaïr implicitly asked is the very question he wanted to be asked.

“It never had need of it before,” he agrees, but that is as far as his caution extends, “I am disbanding the warrior ranks. Fresh mercenaries are to take place of their former posts. To protect the sanctity of our laws, of those to come, and those that have been violated before, as they are violated now.”

Altaïr hides his shock in the furthermost corner of his heart but this hurts him, Al Mualim’s projects for the community are a stab to his chest robbing speech. He has trouble accepting this. It should not be. The very thought is too daunting to contemplate. In the very way the community is Malik’s family, the warriors are his family, and to see them disbanded makes him feel headless. And it appears Al Mualim is there to search his face for reaction to this devastating news, as if he was a tryout, an experiment to test these news on.

“Why, Master?” He doesn’t stutter, but allows pained wonder to ooze into his tone, feeling an inclination and responsibility to let Al Mualim know that he is affected, not because he is Altaïr, but because he is a warrior, and warriors speak with one voice and one mind.

Altaïr doesn’t question how, but Al Mualim knows that he speaks about the disbandment.

“The reasons are pragmatic, Altaïr, I do not expect you to bother yourself with concerns of demobilization.” Upon seeing that Altaïr doubts and confusion aren’t banished, he bolsters his claim with some explanation, “Our war is over, Altaïr. We have no need for warrior ranks of such scale. The warriors are given chance to merge into the community, a reward well deserved. ”

Altaïr removes his thoughts from this last sweetener but sees a glimpse of reason behind this decision. The war _is_ over. On a practical and logistic level, disbanding the army at this point is a pragmatic policy, pure and simple. Using leftovers to fill the ranks of these so-called ‘fresh mercenaries’ to see after the laws (if such things existed in their community) is somehow not a betrayal of principle, but incorporation of a smaller number of former warriors into a similar group under a new name. The war is over, and the city needs new guards. This is why Altaïr was summoned.

“With all respect, Master, I’m a warrior, not a bodyguard.”

“You are whatever I pronounce you to be, Altaïr.” Al Mualim lectures and Altaïr is promptly reminded of his place and the transgression of disobedience he offered in the face of Al Mualim’s generosity, bleak as it is in comparison to the glory of a warrior.

“Apologies, Master,” he says promptly.

“Good,” Al Mualim says with satisfaction, “You will be waged at the same rate of pay as before. Your first mission is to take place in near future. You will be informed of when to offer services to our city.”

“Who will lead this combined effort, Master?” Altaïr asks.

“Robert De Sable, the man you saw upon entrance, and his men. You and the comrades you trust.”

Altaïr gives an acquiescent nod and doesn’t utter another thought.

 

* * *

 

 

Malik keeps the blade flattened against his lower belly, hidden away behind the toga fold draped diagonally across his tunic, awaiting Al Mualim’s appearance, only occasionally managing to keep an eye on Desmond—a poor man unsubtly chasing the woman around the tables in pursuit of attention.

His heart thuds in his ribcage until there is only physical pain in his chest.

To survive, to escape this victorious moment, is not in Malik’s forethought. He commits himself to the task and feels a hot prickling of fearlessness in his belly. One reluctant moment alone could aid his failure and he makes himself remember that he would die to take this man’s life. He longs for it. The final act of revenge cannot be endlessly deferred.

He might die tonight but he can’t see past his own desires.

The odds are not to his advantage. He has one attempt, one chance to succeed before he is killed by the guards. He won’t contemplate the alternative.

The flutter of dark robes catches his eye and Al Mualim slithers into his sight the very instant he leaves the chamber. His husband is not there to follow. Nokem himself must have heard his prayer.

He makes off.

No one but the ignorant crowd is between him and Al Mualim now and the moment is approaching, just as he is foolishly moving towards it, trapped in the game of a tainted heart whose rules he could not question.

Malik may die. He will die.

But the burning desire to kill Al Mualim and even the scales of justice throws everything else into deeper shadows and all paths lead to the murderer as he strides steady across one. He knows where to cut and it’s all he needs to know.

His doubts are pushing to escape and his step is steady and he doubles his grip on the handle and dodges people to avoid attention and prays to Nokem to guide his hand.

He is almost there, he’ll risk everything.

The murderer stands with back turned to him and the chance for assassination stirs something beyond life in Malik and he is drawing the blade.

His eyes move over the point where he is preparing to stab—

—and Altaïr zigzags into his path.

Malik freezes staring at his face, shamed at having been discovered. Ashamed, before it turns into fear.

He is horribly disappointed, for he has allowed his heart to expect revenge, a great mistake when there is room for failure. The result lies clear before him—the core of the reason he lives for snatched away before he could deliver justice, and the imminent result of this failure he can’t control now unleashes a cascade of horrors: arrest, shame, torture, death. Death before he could drag Al Mualim along.

Malik has nowhere to escape as Altaïr snatches him from the narrow path between people even as Malik stares at him in mute astonishment, openmouthed with a question beginning to form in his expression. Altaïr seizes his free hand, the one that’s not pressing the blade to safety, leading, or towing, Malik across the room as they squeeze and thread through the jam of bodies at the mouth of the room, and towards a more secluded place.

Altaïr pulls him into the darkened hallway connecting the two massive rooms, the sound of chatter doesn’t cease but it’s not rising, and Malik allows colder thoughts to take possession of him as Altaïr maneuvers them both behind one of the long curtains conveniently concealing entire walls.

Malik has no time to react as Altaïr pulls the blade from his belt, almost cutting him in the process.

“You thought I wouldn’t see you?” Altaïr hisses in a harsh whisper, “You would kill my master.”

“It would be a glorious day. One you would see never arrive.” Malik whispers back just as harsh and reads the anger from Altaïr’s face.

“Your thirst for vengeance clouds your judgment.”

“No. Obedience clouds yours.”

They pant and the soft sound of fiery breathing fills the brief gap of talk and the matters hanging between them are beyond definition, beyond words, beyond what they could solve tonight, but they stand there facing each other and don’t know where this will lead them.

“I have always known your thirst for revenge and turned from it because it caused me no thought.” Altaïr whispers, lower, following the shift on Malik’s face. As if he morphed into a calmer state, a storm-on-the-horizon kind of expression. Altaïr doesn’t like storms, but he loves this one.

“I once sought his quick death in repayment for his slights. But it’s not so anymore.” Malik says, and the storm brews, it’s already there, Altaïr can feel it on his skin.

“Do not lie to me. Were it not for my interference, you’d have caused the unspeakable, and now you claim innocence—?”

“I claim _vengeance_.” Malik hisses and his eyes are wild, and Altaïr is towering over him but he feels drunk on the power of revenge that swells in Malik’s tone, “With my hands upon Al Mualim’s throat and his blood on fucking floor, spilled by the drop until his life is _drained_.” Malik pushes himself up into Altaïr’s face to carry on his impassioned speech and Altaïr is unsure who of them two is governed by delirium, “To see light fade from his eye and feel the life flee from his worthless body my _only_ _goal in life_.”

Altaïr stands speechless.

Nokem himself has found sanctuary in his husband’s feral expression and gave voice through Malik’s mouth. He is breathtakingly attractive in anger. He is brimming with energy and wildness. It’s not that Malik is trying to entice him, it’s what he is _doing_ that’s enticing Altaïr. He stares into Malik’s merciless, angry face, hoping for the tremor of excitement he had felt during his speech to pass, but it’s not gone.

Altaïr doesn’t want any more fantasies, he wants _his husband_.

The blade slips from loose hold and falls with a clutter and his hands clamp like vice at Malik’s sides and dig between his ribs as he thrusts him into the wall, and his belly tightens with desire even before he bends to take hold of his lips. Malik’s moan of surprise catches between their entwined mouths.

Malik struggles to make sense of the rash viciousness of this action, the sudden embrace, and hilarity of it, the momentary shock of Altaïr’s lips against his and Altaïr kissing him.

He rebels.

What is remarkable about the mutiny is that it never happens.

Malik makes an interrupted attempt to strike his fists into Altaïr’s bare chest, an attempt quickly obstructed by reluctance. Altaïr takes it as encouragement, he doesn’t take it for what it really is. He doesn’t recognize it as a trap. He doesn’t see it as Malik’s attempt at shrewd maneuvering. In this moment, he sees nothing and feels everything he can feel, he doesn’t even have time to compare the reality of it to the imagined fantasizes he used to conjure up between battles.

Altaïr’s kiss doesn’t go past lips but still manages to give Malik an entire narrative story of Altaïr’s rising hope. Of how deeply-desired this action was, how eagerly he waited to connect himself to Malik thus, how he advanced into the kiss torn between two equally daunting choices—between unbridled aggression and greater caution, to avoid discouraging Malik from future kisses.

The warrior hooks hands into Malik’s armpits and snatches him up and heaves him upwards along the wall. Malik’s short tunic hikes up as he wraps his legs around his waist and Altaïr allows himself between Malik’s bare, warm thighs, and suddenly there’s the full weight of the man’s upper body as he crashes into him to trap Malik’s form in mid-air as his hands plummet to cup his rear. He leans him into the wall and flattens himself to Malik’s frame until their bodies are a tight line.

Malik is tense for an instant before his bent, trapped arms wriggle out from the press of bodies to plunge below Altaïr’s arms and latch onto his back claiming the embrace.

Malik knows why he’s doing this but he doesn’t know what he’s doing. He tries telling the sensations apart during this disorderly state of body and chaotic state of mind. There were times, while he was a child, when Leonardo and other adults would kiss him on the cheek. No man has ever touched his lips. Malik doesn’t know _what_ he’s doing when he allows Altaïr to part his lips and immediately feels his tongue, warm and strong, pushing past his teeth. He shuts his eyes. He tries to mimic whatever Altaïr is doing and his husband’s mouth is warm against his. It feels as though hot tickling fingers crawl through his lower gut and he catches himself in a momentary swoon of arousal. He wants to pull away to breathe through this sensation but Altaïr is melding their lips into a new lock and pushing until the back of Malik’s head bumps into the cold stone, tilting his own head to gain deeper access.

His heart leaps into his throat and he feels as though Altaïr will steal it from his mouth and have two, but Altaïr kisses on and steals nothing but a hum of pleasure Malik fails to catch in time, and his heart remains in his chest thudding wildly but it’s difficult to concentrate on all that’s happening at once.

His body apparently relishes in being trapped between a wall and the firm, muscular body of his husband. The warm ball of a different kind of excitement has snuggled in his groin by now, and he recognizes a litany of excuses as they throb through his head: he allowed this for a reason; he is _not_ intrigued by this; he hates Altaïr; it’s too late; he’s too embarrassed to end it; he’s too embarrassed to repeat it; he could have easily avoided it all—in fact, he didn’t, he’s just noticing it all now; he is aroused. And he feels faintly betrayed by his own body. Altaïr tongue is in his mouth until he strays into Altaïr’s after he gets lost in the mess of words, and there is an excited urgency in this kissing back, mutually and diligently shared.

It seems to Altaïr that Malik is equal in desire at last and he drinks down every kiss Malik returns, and offers more, until he is giddy with the thrill of Malik’s consent. Perhaps one day soon Malik might allow Altaïr’s cock between his soft, beautiful lips. But that is a thought he scampers away from when he feels himself already hard enough to show through the armor skirt. The image of Malik taking his cock into his warm mouth swirls around his head for one more instant before he scrambles away from it.

Malik kisses with a fierceness matching his earlier bloodthirst and in these few moments of this furious kissing, he’s blown past the point of meaningful-connection-through-shared-experience into the less appealing and more appalling state of enjoying-what-he-should-not. Enjoying what he intended to use for his _benefit_ , not his enjoyment.

He avoids giving other noises, for the contraction it makes him feel around his heart when Altaïr bucks into him in response to his moans. Yet he listens to it all, to the faint hum of Altaïr’s low moan, to the staccato of Altaïr’s little thrusts into his body, to the soft smack after split-up before new lip-lock. His skin erupts in goose bumps each time Altaïr grinds up and he feels the leathery feathers of his skirt pressing into his groin urgently. He glides his hands up Altaïr’s back and feels the strength of his body, dragging up the inward arc of his spine and over the leather strap keeping his massive shoulder spauldron in place. He is insanely hot to the touch. Malik allows himself to grope Altaïr’s back muscles as he fumbles with the kiss and his head is reeling from the information he is trying to pour into it for processing.

He is _strong_. He is coiled with muscle power and bursting with strength. The things Malik could do if he found a way to control this power like a machine and maneuver it towards his own goal. The things he could make Altaïr do for his favor, if he offered Altaïr fine enough a reward. Altaïr won’t dare refuse him, if Malik offers what Altaïr craves above all other things.

Altaïr’s muscles are taut and flexing under the pressure of his rough touch, but he doesn’t indulge in this line of thinking for too long. The focus grows nearer to his head than to his groin, a cool head is attained only gradually. The reason for consent comes to his mind again. Altaïr wants a taste of his husband and Malik wants to lure Altaïr in with the promise of more—he has allowed him this trial, this little sample.

He pulls off to catch his breath, facing away before Altaïr can take his mouth into another kiss, but Altaïr is restless and refuses to part his mouth from Malik’s body and migrates to his neck. The kisses are ravenous but feel strikingly different compared to those from last night, for reasons that elude Malik at present. The warrior shifts onto the other side of his neck, only grazing their lips once in a wet brush before setting his mouth to work on Malik’s skin. Malik’s thoughts plunge between his legs where Altaïr is grinding like a man starved for intimate contact, and harder thrusts during a new lip-lock Altaïr manages to start are giving him the radical suggestion that Altaïr could move to something racy and altogether too indecent for both the place and Malik’s liking.

His body turns frosty and his kiss grows remote until it ceases and he pushes against Altaïr’s hard chest allowing his hands to rest briefly splayed across Altaïr’s hard pecs with palms pressed into his pebbled nipples, collecting his thoughts while Altaïr is still struggling with his own.

He refrains from jerking his head to the side as Altaïr leans in, to make himself appear no less inviting while he pushes himself free of Altaïr’s arms and totters to his feet, his body cramped by the unresolved thirst for release.

When he looks up, the torch light falling through the curtain’s side gap is lighting his husband’s hungry, hopeful face. Malik allows his own face tenderness and fixes the expression firmly across his face. He loops his hand adoringly around Altaïr’s neck and borrows Sheker’s honeyed voice for this ensuing task.

“Please let me. I’ve been waiting for seven years to do this,” he whispers in hushed tones, as if his homicidal intention isn’t any different than proposal for a beach visit, “I’ll be an obedient husband if you lend aid to my cause. I’ll _kneel_ to you—”

“What fever seizes your brain that you would think I’d agree.” Altaïr growls, with heavy heart but clear mind, “Never speak these words again.” He lectures.

Malik doesn’t allow his expression to fall and needs but a moment to collect himself.

“What’s been said cannot be undone. And what’s been done cannot be unmade.” He tightens his hand and digs into Altaïr’s neck, a gesture which is not affectionate but soon rectified as Malik props himself up on his toes to trim the gap between them without closing it, “Prove yourself more than a monster and stand as my husband and I’ll yield to you.”

It hits Altaïr like a slap. He is ashamed at the amount of time it took him to recognize what Malik has been trying to seduce him into. Malik’s enticing offer is no less than plain deceit, his husky breath and sultry, beautiful eyes no more than cheap bribery. It dawns on him why Malik _allowed_ him to come this close. That Malik might have faked enjoyment makes him nauseous.

“You did this to grow favor,” he realizes dully.

Malik say nothing. He, too, is grasping the sinking reality that he is losing his battle against Altaïr’s reason. On his husband’s face is less injury than he expected or hoped to find, but he suspects that Altaïr is hiding what he doesn’t want him to see and unleashing his dormant anger instead.

“Continue with your present course and see it wither.”

“Altaïr—” Malik starts.

“That you would think me a fool is insult enough,” Altaïr quips in. Malik clamps his mouth shut and the gesture is supplemented with a scowl. Altaïr snatches the hand resting awkwardly around his neck and removes it, holding it between them, but bereft of intention to hurt him physically, “Set your attentions towards our marriage and do not see them stray again.”

Altaïr did not intend to leave just yet.

A shift in shadows and light filtering through the chink between the floor and the heavy curtain is subtle but visible before Altaïr begins to feel another presence and suspects an impostor. It’s long enough a track towards the end of the curtain to persuade him to a shorter path so he stoops into a crouch and lifts the heavy folds to find a now more familiar visage of a man listening in on them or spying.

Abbas’ mouth pulls into a smug smile and for a mere instance Altaïr is awash with fear and cold sweat. But Abbas is alone in number and alone in his wayward intentions. No one is there to arrest or kill Malik for attempted assassination and it’s as if Malik senses this as he emerges behind the shield of Altaïr’s back glaring daggers at Abbas.

“Ah, there is your little pup.” Abbas grins at Malik-not-Altaïr but makes himself the enemy of both, “His tongue is sharp. Perhaps because it’s been wrapped around less esteemed places than men’s cocks.”

Abbas’ grin is tense, his hand stiff between the folds of his robe where he is keeping a weapon at the ready, hoping to provoke a clash, but this time the tables are turned. Altaïr feels nothing more than simple pity for him.

“Jealous men torture themselves, Abbas.”

Malik’s hand is in his as he pulls him along and Malik follows after him wordlessly and they walk back into the atrium with his hand in Altaïr’s and fingers wrapped around his husband’s. A show of unity only for Abbas’ keen eye, for a man a common enemy to them both.

They return and Malik acts as little more than a puppet led around by Altaïr as he collects Ezio and a crushed Desmond who is still regarding Lucy (Ezio revealed her name to him) from afar and feeling like she’s someone beyond his reach. She is exchanging words with Al Mualim with an informality which makes Desmond question his own earlier readiness to approach her, a woman of position which makes the gap between them insurmountable and ridiculously vast.

Altaïr collects them aside to relay what transpired between him and Al Mualim leaving out talk of disbandment at present, and finds them in consent to this private mission the master has prepared for them. They wait until Al Mualim concludes the exchange with Lucy and issues an order for her, sending her off with a handful of guards for tasks unfamiliar the warriors. This dubious group squeezes past Desmond and slips by in a haste as the three of them come to stand before Al Mualim to receive further instruction, and the man sends them off with blessings after this altogether quick and unexceptional affair.

They breathe fresh air before Lucy’s shady group can leave the grounds, a group only Desmond is paying attention to while they linger before the entrance in odd silence.

Desmond stares in stupefied daze after the woman that’s leading the men past gates and into the night, as if she offended him, his friends, and all his ancestors. In the stretch of silence that expands among them, it dawns on Desmond that everyone is staring at him and that he is expected to explain himself as all eyes bore into him due to the bewilderment etched into his face. Desmond’s gaze darts from Ezio to Altaïr, and from Altaïr to Malik, before he blurts out in the most urgent whisper:

“She just grabbed my butt.”

Malik is the only one who breaks the night with laughter.

 

* * *

 

 

It feels like hours before they reach their courtyard, and it feels like it’s too late for children to be outside, however safe, but there they are.

They pass through the tunnel and Malik is towing after Altaïr as if pulled by some invisible string, having walked all the way in religious silence. Inside, a blazing fire is casting light and warmth around the courtyard, with children of diverse ages huddled around it while old men recite tales from the creation myth.

Altaïr spares a long look as he walks past, but no more than that, and Malik halts in his tracks and devotes more time to this familiar and cherished sight. Not so long ago, he was one of those children, embraced by the community and fed love and tales and care. He would rather spend the night with the community than linger at home with Altaïr as company. He would rather, but he is too tired to be infected by their enthusiasm, too riddled with darkness to be engrossed by the brightness of fire. He stays still for a few more moments, and during this time he manages to recognize the part of myth following Hiba’s murder, a tale retold by a grayed old man with a deep booming voice, and Malik’s ears want to pick up the tale, his heart wants to hear the next words:

“... and the earth cried for its god and mourned that it can’t have him in his death. The earth shook but couldn’t move dead Hiba from the rock, it shook waking [Ya’ar](http://the-king-of-novices.tumblr.com/post/114871631011/live-forever-or-die-trying-the-pantheon-6-10) from winter sleep, waking Nokem from slumber to find his other half missing. And [Ya’ar](http://the-king-of-novices.tumblr.com/post/114871631011/live-forever-or-die-trying-the-pantheon-6-10) found Nokem combing the island in vain search for brother and told him the evil tale his forest had whispered to him, the tale of how Ga’ash killed and trapped Hiba’s dead body into his mountain...”

The old man’s voice disperses towards the end but the words still echo like a tinnitus, until the sudden forte of his thunderous voice, the broad splay of fingers over fire, the sharp wide eyes, the wild glimmer of mock anger, all hurl the huddle of children into gasps and big round eyes.

“Nokem’s pain and wrath knew no bounds! His _roar_ of grief traveled the world driving gods to fear, the heavens wept, the ground cracked and spit fire while Nokem swore revenge. His heart constricted with grief but swelled with promise of vengeance...”

Altaïr calls from the stairs and Malik doesn’t answer his invitation.

He stands and his heart swells within his chest.

One day, he will have Al Mualim’s life. He will have it, or he will die.

 

 

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> **I promised some EzioLeo but I didn’t want to just squeeze it in here but give it a proper start, so I had to shift it for the next chapter, I’m terribly sorry!**  
>   
> 
> I must thank all wonderful people who spoke to me after the first chapter and those who provided encouragement and comfort during the writer's block I suffered. Thank you for the words and stories you give in return, thank you for the kudos.
> 
> And thanks to everyone who decides to participate in puzzling out which god is which character. Don't be embarrassed to guess, I'm accepting all speculations and guesses <3


	3. Chapter 3

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> I made [a prezi](http://prezi.com/gip9vov8u-e1/?utm_campaign=share&utm_medium=copy&rc=ex0share) for the city map (you can zoom in and move around, first image is the entire island and the second is the inner city).
> 
> Reminder:
> 
> Malik = [Nokem](http://the-king-of-novices.tumblr.com/post/104486337526/live-forever-or-die-trying-the-pantheon-1-9) (solved by [the_one_from_the_forest](http://archiveofourown.org/users/the_one_from_the_forest/profile))  
> Kadar = [Hiba](http://the-king-of-novices.tumblr.com/post/105028879746/live-forever-or-die-trying-the-pantheon-3-9) (solved by [the_one_from_the_forest](http://archiveofourown.org/users/the_one_from_the_forest/profile))  
> Altair = [Gdila](http://the-king-of-novices.tumblr.com/post/104486350666/live-forever-or-die-trying-the-pantheon-2-9) (solved by [tanzende-wasserspeier](http://tanzende-wasserspeier.tumblr.com/))  
> Ezio = [Daga](http://the-king-of-novices.tumblr.com/post/105817154146/live-forever-or-die-trying-the-pantheon-4-9) (solved by [Moondreamer](http://archiveofourown.org/users/Moondreamer/pseuds/Moondreamer))  
> Desmond = ?  
> Leonardo = [Ya'ar](http://the-king-of-novices.tumblr.com/post/114871631011/live-forever-or-die-trying-the-pantheon-6-10) (solved by an anon)  
> Lucy = Sheker (solved by [annyfranny](http://annyfranny.tumblr.com/))  
> Claudia = [Masekha](http://the-king-of-novices.tumblr.com/post/106253964456/live-forever-or-die-trying-the-pantheon-5-9) (solved by [westerbroski](http://westerbroski.tumblr.com/))  
> Rauf = Barzel  
> Al Mualim = Ga'ash (solved by [whats-the-bizness-yeaah](http://whats-the-bizness-yeaah.tumblr.com/))
> 
> Enjoy another chapter before the story assumes a much darker tone.

 “I would have words.”

“I would not.” Malik grouches.

As he passes the bed, both of his hands are occupied and his gaze shunning Altaïr who awaits in bed. Malik avoids talk Altaïr is anxious for. He puts his double-nozzled oil lamp upon Nokem’s pedestal and lifts the amphoriskos in his other hand—a smallish amphora that he tilts up-and-over oozing oil into the fuel chamber through the pouring hole without spilling a drop. He sets the amphora aside and puts his palms up in quiet prayer. Altaïr listens to it. It’s no more than a dimmed whisper in the vastness of silence around them. The two flickers of light peeking from the nozzles sputter against the hushed whisper of Malik’s prayer for a time that extends longer than Altaïr is wont of. 

The glow of lights plays haphazardly across Malik’s smart sleeping tunic, a pristine white washed in warm yellow, except for the two thick linings stretching from the shoulders downwards—they glitter gold beneath the light of lamp.  From his position in the bed, Altaïr can’t see the pretty knots falling down the side of his nightclothes. Altaïr wishes he could ask Malik where he acquired such clothes. He wishes he could ask many more things. He had hoped for an easier exchange of words between them, yet Malik gives him an expensive impassiveness—expensive to maintain after all that passed between them tonight—and Altair extracts only disobedience from this behavior. The truth is he would rather hold Malik in his arms tonight than have words. The truth is that Malik is playing a game of aloofness to distance himself from Altaïr and everything that has happened.

“I hear you whisper to Nokem. Do you believe he heeds your prayers?”

It’s not the first time that Altaïr interrupted what is not meant to be cheated of peace. 

“He speaks to me often, whispering of revenge and blood.” Malik’s hands rest in his lap, though not for long. His tone is soft enough to encourage Altaïr to smuggle in more words. 

“Then entreat your protector to cease such thoughts from head. I’d not see soft words replaced with bold terms.”

Malik says nothing and his silence gives rise to impatience. Altaïr wants words. Or his husband in bed. At this point either is welcome. Said husband puts the lamp out and leaves it at Nokem’s feet, and finds his place in bed through familiar darkness with nary a word. Altaïr doesn’t know if emotion or disobedience is driving him to silence, but he changes his course, shuffling across the mattress, closer to Malik without laying touch upon him.

“I would give my life to see your laughter and compassion fill this house.”

“I would not want your life.” Malik refuses the offer without addressing the core of Altair’s desire, his words muffled beneath the half of the quilt he secured for himself before Altaïr could wrestle it from him during the night. Altaïr’s presence is ominous behind his back but he is too tired for this, too tired for his husband’s sudden, never-ending, quest for words.

“It’s time to release your hold on past. The past cannot be changed. Let us turn eye towards what could lie ahead.”

Malik unfurls onto his back with a flush of sudden anger that sweeps Altaïr off track, and not a full moment later he flashes a glare, though dimmed by darkness no less wild than the one after his assassination attempt—an ugly glare no one wants to have business with.

“Why would I place my love into the hands of a warrior who wouldn’t aid me?”

Altaïr hasn’t mentioned love. But he hasn’t struck wide off-mark.

“Do you think me a fool?” Altaïr says. In this position, he holds advantage, towering over a body he could subdue with some struggle, “I know what you were aiming to do. You’d see me the instrument of your vengeance against Al Mualim. I’m a warrior, but not _your_ warrior.”

“You are no warrior,” Malik spits in mockery, “you are a soldier, a dog listening to the commands of a master—”

“Yes, I’ve gladly obeyed orders—”

“Obedience is a word forged by monsters like Al Mualim seeking to enslave people in lies and order—!”

“I burn for no cause but my own!” Altaïr snarls in kind, “What I did was to protect my people and my husband.”

This softener misses its target—Malik is no more victim to it than he is to Altaïr’s anger.

“Is that what you believe you did? _Fool_.” The anger is vast on Malik’s face. Aggressive and wild. It’s what Altaïr is starting to find disturbingly attractive, an affront to his years-long image of docile domesticity. “If your cause is to play blind and obedient dog, then you march towards certain victory.”

Altaïr glares out of sheer sense of duty. He shoves himself above Malik's body for the uncultured need to get closer to it, and he shackles unresisting wrists to bed for need to tame the craving, or unleash it. “That’s not _loyalty_ ,“ Malik persists, as if Altaïr is not straddling him, “You’re like a dog trained when not to shit, you’ve never been faced with decisions heavy with consequence, you always fall to your knees absent mind, but you, _a_ _slave_ , wound turn me into one also.”

Malik doesn’t even resist. He knows. He knows Altaïr can’t force himself onto him, he knows any threat of punishment is impotent.

“These being the words of a man who would throw himself to knees for aid.”

Malik barks out a laugh, his warm breath washes across the warrior's neck pulling him nearer.

“Oh you’d love that, would you not? Falling to my knees before you. To enslave me as you wish to enslave my body by shoving your cock inside? Try if you can.”

Altaïr takes the sting well, doesn't dwell on the insult, but his grip tightens and Malik resists through a derisive snarl but leaves his body devoid of any resistance.

“My gaze is trained on your eyes and face.”

“Yet your behavior proves worthy of neither.”

Altaïr feels fiercely out of place. If he struck his husband violently now, he’d gain little and lose whatever little he acquired until now. Rape he won’t consider as an alternative. If only Malik would let Altaïr persuade him into the pleasure of sex. If only he would allow Altaïr to show what he could do in bed. If only he would allow closeness. If only he were not blinded by vain vengeance. If only.

He stoops lower and doubles his grip to intimidate Malik into reason, then pulls his wrists up and above his head with ease, but Malik doesn’t shrink back, he puffs his chest out and strains up in pride (a sliver more and he would feel the state of Altaïr’s arousal), he thrusts his head closer to Altaïr’s and _stings_.

“Go on and try to kill me like you killed my brother.”

“I did not kill him.”

“Liar.”

“I was not there when it happened.”

“As you weren't there to protect innocents from slaughter.”

“There were no innocents that night.”

Malik’s face, dark-lit in fury, plunges into brief scandal.

“My _little brother_ —”

“Your people conspired against the city!”

“Is that what you believe? Poor wretch. I hope Nokem lends you his eyes one day that you may see the truth.” Malik concludes in a tired voice, drenched in dismissal. His attention is beginning to wane in the face of Altaïr’s thirst for word, for touch. Altaïr’s grip grows mellow but he leans in and Malik feels his hardness on his belly.

“Go on and take my body—beat it, rape it, conquer it. You will never have my unconquerable will. “

Malik’s words are a mockery but his implication is truthful. His face, swollen with pride he chides Altaïr for. Malik is a husband placed forever beyond Altaïr’s grasp, unattainable. A forbidden fruit he wants to taste. Altaïr is fickle tonight, and Malik catches a glimpse of the brief flutter of his nostrils, reads its warning, but the trajectory of the lust-filled impulse upon which Altaïr acts is too quick, too swift to forestall, and Altaïr plummets to take Malik’s lips before anything can be done to halt it.

Altaïr is too hungry even to try and think of anything except a kiss.

He is on trial for a mere moment but turns assertive as arousal stabs. Malik growls when Altaïr parts his mouth and shoves himself in, like some bully shouldering his way into a room. He might as well have fucked him with the manner in which he entered his mouth. One of his hands above regains freedom after Altaïr’s sets his onto Malik's jaw digging in to keep his mouth open. Malik’s own tongue folds and recoils in automatic distaste, making even more space for Altaïr’s. The warrior keeps his lips clamped firmly onto his husband’s and probes inside his mouth like he wants to engage Malik’s tongue into some action of its own, absent Malik’s consent. 

Something that could partially resemble a moan tears from Malik’s throat and Altaïr bucks into his belly—too hard too be for pleasure, too tame, too painless, to be for punishment. The weight of Altaïr’s cock draws less attention. The grind of Altaïr’s ass against Malik’s own clothed cock and its subsequent bolt of pleasure is what throws him off balance. He guides focus towards struggling, not joining. He puts his free hand to Altaïr’s neck then throat to push him off his face, a move sooner ended than started as Altaïr plucks it off to press it flat above his head while releasing Malik's other hand to take hold of his jaw again, thus rendering his own action senseless in any way other than delaying the strike of Malik’s newly-freed fist against his chest. Altaïr is under his tongue, pushing it up against the roof of his mouth as Malik pounds his fist twice into Altaïr’s hard chest which does very little to nothing at all as Altaïr only lifts his chin to lever Malik’s head against his and fit more comfortably into this hideous excuse for a kiss.

Altaïr kisses on, enduring the dull thudding of fist below his clavicle, for the simple reason of knowing that Malik has not yet put real fight into it, has not ripped his tongue out with his bare teeth, has not swerved down between their bodies to rip his cock off, has not thrown him off as Altaïr is sure he is capable of, and he is hoping that Malik struggles for some completely inane reason.

Malik is suddenly setting himself to pull his thighs up, bereft aggression or struggle, and Altaïr aligns his chest to Malik’s and slides smoothly along the side of his tongue as he finds leverage to lift his knee and let Malik’s thigh take its place as he settles his knee below it and repeats the same with his other leg to accommodate Malik’s mute request. And then, Malik spreads his thighs and fastens his knees to Altaïr’s ribs, drawing him into familiar warmth. Malik’s sleeping tunic is riding up and his calves are digging into his husband’s narrow waist pressing him to himself until Altaïr’s engorged cock sidles up along his own, nothing between them. Altaïr’s body tightens. Arousal begins to prod him all over, whatever thoughts were left depart from his head leaving no place to investigate the underlying motives of all this. 

It feels divine and suspiciously too welcoming. Malik’s remaining hand, now released, clasps at Altaïr’s hip, as if to put to a halt the ensuing roll of hips, and Altaïr plucks up enough attention to follow this hand's path up the muscles ridging his spine and its climb to just below his neck, he feels it flat against his nape before it smooths up his scalp. He grinds his crotch down to glide his shaft along Malik’s and primes himself into thinking they might have sex tonight. It’s then when Malik grasps a handful of his short hair, yanks him up, measures his punch exactly to catch Altaïr on the jaw. His left thigh flattens to mattress to bar the obstacle for Altaïr’s sorry tumble sideways and the warrior rolls off with meager protest but heavy disappointment, having learned from past and new mistakes. 

“And stay on your side.” Malik quips for a good measure while he turns onto his side, the unfavored one, and wraps himself inside the conquered portion of quilt. 

Altaïr lies splayed out on his back, with limbs asprawl like a starfish, and cock stubbornly hard from the memory of his husband’s body. 

He revisits his latest lesson. If Malik drops sign of consent, it’s usually gods playing tricks on him. 

“Your lips taste of honey.” Altaïr says and listens to silence between them. “Your words taste of poison.”

Malik lies awake with a smirk of contempt. He won’t lick his lips to sweep the imprint of his husband's lips off, to avoid drawing it further inside himself.

He falls asleep with Altaïr’s kiss on his lips.

 

* * *

 

And then his luck changes abruptly. 

He is lying with cheek deeply-pressed into his downy pillow and the quilt covering him up to shoulder, for the simple reason that Altaïr didn’t try to annex it tonight, for the same reason Malik  doesn’t want it anywhere near his own body in this very moment. His breathing is stifled less by the press into the pillow and far more by the heat—an unexpected turn for this time of year. It has been a mistake adding more sheets to the new quilt to secure a sleep devoid of shivering cold.

Malik lolls between sleep and a state of half-consciousness, then stretches out on his belly, until he arrives at the point where he is wasted enough from the heat. It’s the point when he feels like the sheets are stuck to his skin like honey and he wants them off. He kicks the quilt off sluggishly, with blatant disregard for how it’s affecting Altaïr, and this tangled bundle shirrs down to his calves and feet. He doesn’t harbor a wish to look Altaïr’s way, nor the strength to open his eyes to consider the hour. He is too ridden by sleep (much welcomed after the meager amount of time spent in slumber last night) to even consider trying to listen to Altaïr for signs of nightmare, but there is a distinct lack of twitching and spasming in his husband’s slumber.

He rolls onto his side, facing away from his husband, and his sleeping tunic feels no different than a damp, spongy thing sticking to his chest. The knots dig into him harder than before. With what little conscience he could fetch from sleep’s grasp, he curses Altaïr for taking up the side of the bed he prefers. Not even the heat, nor the knots, can persuade him into facing his husband in bed.

The knots pain him.

His mind is shackled by pining for slumber and doesn’t branch far off from the single most urgent need to _rid_ himself of the knots digging into his flank and he is carried by this most basic and mindless need, the heat wave is slamming into him, until he can’t identify a possible damage in tearing his tunic off and rushing off into sleep. Turning his nightclothes inside out to avoid knots will cause further grievance as the golden lining stretching across the front will serve only to irritate his skin.

There is some faint warning drumming at the back of his head that forfeiting the sleepwear will leave him butt-naked, but it’s stifling hot and very dark, and it’s enough to lull him into safety. The clothes find the floor. He grabs about for a sheet from beneath the quilt to cover his nudity, and subjects himself to the heat it brings.

 

* * *

 

With the morning comes the test to Altaïr’s self-discipline.

He is unprepared for the sight. He lies on his side staring ahead feeling much like a headless chicken since the very moment he registers Malik, feeling as if his world shifted on axis as it has been doing for the past few days. He fades out for a moment, but returns to the sight of Malik’s nude form, relaxed, melted belly-down into the mattress, with arms pulled up but slack and burrowed beneath each side of his pillow. His head is facing away, but the sight keeps Altaïr’s veins hot.

He doesn't budge, feels his eyes bulging out during the shrieking chaos that ensues in his mind. Malik naked. Naked. Naked. _Naked_.

Altaïr looks at it and curses accordingly.

It’s tantamount to Malik keeping a firm grip on his cock but never stroking him. A tease without release. He realizes his curses collide with a prompt memory—a brief reminiscence on what he used to jerk off to in the tiny gap between night and morning before Desmond and Ezio would wake. The images he used to conjure up to guide himself into the relief of a climax, a figure of his husband as inviting and enticing on their bed as he looks now, waiting for his return, until the day when Altaïr could claim him and bind him to himself.

The entirety of is body throbs in a way that is bothering him for reasons that include the aftermath of a headache Malik’s punch had caused only hours earlier. Altaïr squeezes his eyes shut to this overexposure to Malik’s nudity, his meekness in slumber, and massages his temples to rub some sense into them. It’s more complex than simple surrender to the lowest in him. He wants to go closer, but Malik’s behavior aggravates the problem. 

The smallest, lazy shift in body tugs his attentions across the bed, but he doesn’t find Malik awake, nor does the youth appear close to waking. Altaïr listens to the cadence of his breathing for a while and again sifts through the sight presented to him absent thought, down the pleasing contrast between Malik’s skin and the white of the yielding mattress, and the modest gap between the sheet draped loosely across the back of his thighs and his exposed rear.

Altaïr’s eyes spring down to the stiffness of his shaft which is a sight undeserving of surprise, but no less troubling. He stares at his erection before he settles on his back, clasps his hand around the base to lift it off his lower belly, stares at it for a moment longer—anything to avoid Malik’s body which is trying to catch his attention. Altaïr is endeavoring a bit too hard and still disappointed in himself as he gives in and chances another look to follow the rise and fall of Malik’s breath before he plunges down the length of his back and up towards his plump little ass. He gives himself a couple of strokes barren from thought but his palm is dry, his fingers tough from gripping the sword handle for years. His calloused hand is as uninviting as Malik’s dark scowl. He lies on his back, stiff with the lack of joy in marriage, with a hand around a cock, stiff for very differing reasons.

His body is flushing with arousal and his face reddening with obstructed possibilities. Malik wouldn’t allow the solid press of Altaïr’s warmth to touch him. He wouldn’t allow Altaïr to commence a slow journey of kisses from his nape and down into the valley of his lower back, but Altaïr puts his worn out fantasies to prolonged use anyway and imagines setting lips upon skin and gliding down his spine, and then shifts to more baser thoughts, like kneading into the plump swell of his ass, preparing him for his cock, having him wake filled to brim with his husband and moaning from the pleasure of it.

The hand on his cock holds still keeping the shaft upright, but the other tapers down his belly thumbing over the ridged muscles, hard, chiseled from war and battle, not pliant and soft like his husband’s body more rich with softer curves shaped by a different kind of work and life. Altaïr would feel like a new man if he were to be admitted to smooth down his husband’s body and allow his hands exploration to familiarize himself to something other than scars and tough skin and sharp muscles. He wants something else. He wants something new to touch. He wants Malik’s moans to ricochet off the walls of their bedroom but laying his hands on Malik is deliberately inviting trouble.

And yet he feels an absurd surge of lust coursing his veins. It isn’t so much about fucking—a fact attested by his years of disciplined abstinence from sex—as it is about coming that close to his husband to share the intimate bond and thrusting Malik closer into his own embrace. There is now a different sort of undertone to his reverie compared to the one he used to have during war, and compared to the one he reveled in while peeking at his husband through the tunnel for the first time after seven years. His husband is not a meek creature he had hoped to find and his fantasies are shifting accordingly. Instead of blind obedience, he wants Malik’s trust. Instead of unquestioning admiration, he wants genuine closeness.

Altaïr feels some sense bumped into him and then feels like not having his itch scratched, so he releases his loose hold on his cock.

He gets to his feet before he is aware of the motion.

The warrior slithers away with determination in shreds but intact, very frustrated about the state of things. Prior to wandering out into the kitchen to snoop around and find himself meal, he swathes his protesting groin into a loose bind of loincloth and sets about his business. He hasn’t got any other to occupy himself with at present.

Inside the kitchen, he rumbles around to see if he could chance upon clean plates, which prompts him into deciphering the structuring order of things he missed inside this room. He finds himself momentary relief in inspection of a newly-discovered chest hiding beneath one of the counters, in a corner behind the flour sack and amphoras that he didn’t bother to check yesterday. The discovery is less likely to yield plates, but no less thrilling. He shifts the heavy amphoras—one one up to the neck with oil the other with half the value of wine—remembers a moment too late to avoid scraping along the ceramic tiles, but keeps this in mind while drawing the chest out into the open. There is silverware. Affluent-looking engraved knives and forks, encrusted flatware, occasional mismatched cup. That’s how far he can examine without shifting the items around which is a restraint born of caution, to evade waking Malik. Atop this little treasure, wedged between a disproportionate number of oval plates and a stacked collection of wrapped knives, are two identical cups.

Altaïr picks them up with care.

They are not so identical, after all. As early as he turns them over in his hands, he finds the embossed engravings of two different gods upon the polished silver, and gold lettering beneath the images of [Nokem](http://the-king-of-novices.tumblr.com/post/104486337526/live-forever-or-die-trying-the-pantheon-1-9) on one and [Hiba](http://the-king-of-novices.tumblr.com/post/105028879746/live-forever-or-die-trying-the-pantheon-3-9) on the other. The cups are of rare beauty. Selling one could potentially provide a good measure of food worth a month. They are heavy with silver. The grooves of delicate carving are filled in with purest gold. Altaïr has no qualms about pinpointing their origin. The contents of this chest are someone’s heirloom. Malik’s.

Malik’s home was burned to ground. If what Altaïr suspects is true, then a child of ten wandered out into the aftermaths of the Massacre—into a city torn apart reeking of fires and blood—the very moment Altaïr was shipped abroad into the first throes of battle.

The amalgam of a smile and pain scrunches up his lip but he can’t bring himself to replace it with anger. Fearlessness it was that attracted him to Malik. And loyalty to those departed from this world. A strange notion to fall for in the midst of bloodshed. He can’t bring himself to chide Malik for placing himself out in the open after Altaïr gave him a home to hide in. A child wading through char and blood to collect the broken pieces of his home. The statue of Nokem in their bedroom must be restored heirloom as well. Even with all Malik’s share of Altaïr’s soldiering pay collected, he couldn’t have possibly bought such treasure.

A vertigo seizes him, engages him as he puts a cup back into the chest to rub his face, pinch the bridge of his nose, dig into his jaw. Malik brought the statue into his home. Towed it across the entire city with blood-thirsty warriors roaming about preying on survivors, and up hill. Harvested what survived the fire. Preserved it. Allowed Altaïr to eat off it yesterday.

A hot nausea crawls up his throat and he presses the cold surface of the remaining cup to his temple before he jerks away from it as if burned. This rush of thoughts leaves him in the middle of nothing and he finds himself staring at Hiba’s curious face. He cools his head until his faculties return and ponders the importance of this god whom he has failed to properly venerate.

He worshiped Hiba as a child, once, long ago. Since then, he has failed to acknowledge Hiba’s influence in the matter of family and household and offered misplaced prayer to [Gdila](http://the-king-of-novices.tumblr.com/post/104486350666/live-forever-or-die-trying-the-pantheon-2-9)—a god not inclined to listen to prayers concerning domestics. It feels a wasted effort. This thought he keeps far-removed from his heart lest Gdila hears this sacrilege.

Altaïr reaches for Nokem’s cup and allows its weight to settle in his palm while he thumbs across the engravings crying out at his own stupidity, inwardly, as he promises to dedicate prayer to Hiba and plead his divine intervention in his sorry marriage.

Noise chucks suddenly from the bedroom and his focus jumps at it.

His hands refuse to part from the cups but he drops into a crouch to peek through the double-ended fireplace, quickly enough to see the drag of sheet as Malik exits the bedroom. Altaïr is quicker to rise and he is up soon enough to see Malik swerve left and into the mouth of the kitchen. He must have caught notice of Altaïr’s absence, or heard him.

Altaïr is expecting to find him gruff—for waking him, for finding him naked, for simply having looked at him, or for some other reason he would fish out of the sea of possible insults to his person—but Malik pads into the kitchen bare-chested with the white sheet riding low on his hips, his hair an untamed tangle sticking out at a few quarreling angles, with residue of sleep roaming his face. Altaïr refuses to divulge any expression but knows that Malik could jerk him around by his hard-on anywhere he wanted with that look of sleep saturating his pouty face.

It is an awkward and puzzling position for the warrior to be regarded with a reddening in cheeks while only hours ago he was elbowed and punched and snarled at for having the gall to taste his husband’s lips again. But Malik’s blush turns to naught, his creased brows unwind to offer space for fear and he opens his mouth, closes it, and stands frozen. What is strange about it is that his look isn’t directed at Altaïr but at the cups he is holding. As if Altaïr discovered something precious he could now use against him.

Puzzled, Altaïr takes in his husband’s focus on the cups in his hands and measures the fear in Malik’s eye. He lifts them up.

“Do these hold value?”

 _They do_ , Malik’s small nod says. They hold immense value. He is put out at seeing Altaïr hold what he doesn’t allow anyone to touch.

“Then I won’t disturb their peace.” Altaïr assures and turns towards the open chest.

He leaves the cups be. He wouldn’t drink from them if his life depended on it. For respect which Malik still owes in return. He closes the chest and restores it to its former place.

Malik studies him for a handful of moments, takes a considering look at his lax hands, blatantly slips up to Altaïr’s crotch and takes notice of the weight of his husband’s hardened cock straining through his loincloth. Malik can’t really deny the strength of Altaïr’s given word so he doesn’t. He turns away and pads off into the bedroom wordlessly.

 

* * *

 

The community is getting into its swing when Altaïr makes himself known inside the courtyard.

The table is lonesome and embraces Altaïr’s loneliness as he settles onto the bench bearing food. Two chunks of sausage, a fat slice of smoked cheese, butter, the leftover of bread rolls, with innards supple enough to eat or at least not tough enough to be unpalatable. A knife, a wine pitcher, three cups—the ordinary ones. The cups he assigns not for Malik as he doesn’t expect him to join for meal, but for the uninvited company he expects nonetheless. As for the bread, he felt uninhibited enough to appropriate all of the remaining bread—first for having seen Malik make preparations for new bread, and because he’d spend half his sack of war spoils on nonsense before he’d allow waste of food. He cuts the smoked sausage into a modest meat tray, adds cheese along the other side of the plate, and cuts the bread rolls in halves to arrange on the second plate.

He eats his portion waiting for the group of elderly women to return, these carriers of information who wake before sunrise and gather all sorts of tidings from across the city. From who has the freshest fish on the market, to what events are to be held, and what news travel the forum—they spread out like apprentices of Sheker to get hold on every talk and gossip before they return to their communities. Altaïr awaits their return to inquire about the best artisans, best shops to visit on market, to give his house adornment.

His plots for visiting the market have barely taken shape when he registers Malik hopping down the stairs with handfuls, armfuls, of their quilt and striding over towards Leonardo’s apartment. He tries to not give him notice, tries, and admits himself into shameful surrender as he returns his gaze to pursue Malik and feels a stab of satisfaction at watching him smothered by the disorderly heap of bedspread layers as he clutches at them lacking vision. It's an amusing sight, but Malik's feet seem to know the path well enough to carry him across it absent sight before he elbows his way through the door and ebbs away into the shop.

Altaïr is lulled into peace and everything seems quiet enough for a moment.

The children are sparse this morning. The majority seems to have decided to attend school today. Altaïr preferred going to school almost every day. He decided from early on to focus primarily on physical training and attend mandatory studies in-between, according to a schedule which was less evasive and more inclined towards his personal predilections. He's never had a talent for music, though he has an ear keen to its beauty. He imagines Malik as the kind of child who attended almost all studies, as his skills seem to be widespread. Altaïr had tried his hand at calligraphy and art, and though with average skill, he shelved it at fourteen clarifying this decision to the mentor, his aspiration for physical training at which he excelled given as the reason for this decision. An orphan, Altaïr had no one beside the school mentors to bestow counsel on him.

During the war, Altaïr had listened to tales of foreign schools and they appeared vile to him, as something a child would not want to attend in. Until he was told that children have no freedom in choosing when or what they attend. It appeared to him as organized and orderly as foreign religion—an order of things Altaïr couldn’t digest.

Three figures walk in across the sun-dappled path and straight into his dream of bygone past.

Claudia is at the forefront of this esteemed group, with her dark robes parted to reveal breeches and tunic beneath, with Ezio and Desmond in tow. Altaïr is unprepared for this fourth addition to their band, but hospitable and not evasive about welcoming her as they settle round. Desmond and Ezio clean out the table in record time leaving the plates empty before they can even properly take their helmets off. And how odd, that they would cling to their warrior relics when Altaïr lifted the veil of a vain dream last night as they were leaving Al Mualim’s property. Both of them know the warriors are no more. Yet when Ezio produces a satchel and gives them a comb each, Altaïr too takes to preening the tail of his helmet after he retrieves it from his bedroom, bearing more food offerings to Claudia. She feasts on what Altaïr brought her from his kitchen, wrapped in their solemn silence of solemn combing through tails with solemn expressions on face.

Odd, how easily Altaïr is swayed into this show of past. Odder still how Altaïr seems to have managed to start cutting ties first. He attributes this feat to his personal intricate marriage and his current preoccupation with it. Altaïr is one of the rare warriors who are committed to marriage. He is close to no man as he is close to Desmond and Ezio, yet he feels like he’s made of a different kind of metal. After all, Altaïr knew that they would flock to him and not the other way around. He is the one who settled down first, long ago. He feels their presence but feels different. Not more mature per se, but bound by different ties compared to the two of them. Ezio and Desmond share no intimate ties, none that Altaïr knows of, and he is unsure as to how well they understand him in this matter. Ezio favors jumping from conquest to conquest. Desmond loves women. He _adores_ them. Upon one occasion, Desmond put great efforts into assuring him he’d rather go down on ten women than receive one blowjob, which Altaïr couldn’t understand, but it wasn’t his place to understand. It is a thing Desmond has preference for and not Altaïr’s to meddle with.

But all three have let military discipline slide. And by no coincidence, they are as bereft occupation as Altaïr is, explaining their presence in Altaïr’s community. They are sans pursuit, robbed of their vocation, and in short, they are without employment. At present. And this current echo of past—more pure-voiced bark than echo—is just another way of ruining the reality of the present for a few quiet moments. They should part from their [armor](http://the-king-of-novices.tumblr.com/post/105817092231/the-king-of-novices-my-first-ever-coloring-of), but they can’t, as it causes pain of having to leave it behind forever.

Altaïr grips the dark, tawny root of his tail and combs down in gentle slopes, until the ivory tip is not an unkempt collection of bushy hairs tickling his thigh but a tip sharpened into a slick cusp. He feels along the gleaming eagle beak at the front, knows every bump and imperfection. He pets down the eagle tail in idle reverie until Claudia starts flicking bread-pellets at him across the table to wrench him from the memory of warriors collectively combing their tails before battle.

Altaïr frowns and she turns his sour expression away with a smile, innocuous enough to look suspicious.

“How fares your marriage?”

She rests her face in her palm and balances a bread pellet at the rim of her cup, the one she is sharing with Ezio, before she gives the pellet a flick with her nail, and it falls plop straight into the wine.

“Same as always. Two men at constant odds.”

The side of her mouth stretches into a half-smile and hides behind her palm, and she ponders in this strange way until the other sibling interrupts her wooly thoughts.

“All rules are same, Altaïr,” Ezio says and sounds like it took an effort to part this prized knowledge from his mouth for something that could benefit Malik, in ways that are altogether too opaque to grasp, “The rules of love are same as the rules of war—if you can win at one you can win at others.” But if you asked Ezio what the rules are, it was always some rather complicated explanation Ezio would try to sell as undemanding and easy, although it is most certainly not true.

Ezio doesn’t sulk when Claudia reaches to seize his tied hair—a move sluggish and conspicuous enough to be seen and allowed by Ezio—and tugs his head back by the ponytail, the source of her grievance most probably being Ezio’s uncalled-for addition to their exchange. She then smoothes his rumpled ponytail down, mimicking what Ezio is doing to his helmet tail.

“We fight across purposes.” Altaïr says to her.

Claudia releases her hold on Ezio’s hair and gives her sweet smile a new touch. On her face is a look roaring of more than it looks, her visage a book of unspoken tales, and even though Altaïr tries turning all the pages of her face, he finds them equally blank and equally unyielding, and her words are equally mystifying to him.

“Then find a way to unite them.”

 

* * *

 

“Malik?”

Malik shuffles a sliver to the side, spins on heel, and tilts his head to peek past the folds of his baggage.

“How did you know?”

Salai sits on the far end of the room lodged deep into the sofa yet inexplicably able to look beyond graceful, with a bare foot peeking beneath the folds of her navy dress. There’s a rattle of needles as she switches tools and recommences her stitching without rushing to field the baggage from Malik’s arms. It is a debatably rude thing to do, unless it is Salai who does it. Her hair is lax and spread across bared shoulders in loose curves framing her smirking face.

“I know that quilt. I helped maestro stitch it.”

Malik sighs, promptly reminded of the motive of his visit.

“And I’d recognize your gloves anywhere.” Salai reveals as Malik takes to putting the quilt down in an orderly manner, across a table that seems least messy, “Come look at this.” She beckons.

“Where’s Leonardo?” Malik inquires as he saunters over and Salai rises to let her dress unfold, and then smooths out her current work across her flat chest.

“In his study, stitching his invention together instead of clothes,” Salai waves the matter off as trifle, “Come, look at this. I had to sew it on my own, it’s latest fashion abroad.”

Malik stares at the uneventful, foreign-looking bodice with distaste.

He doesn’t hide his grimace. It is something a foreign man would wear. Salai cares as much for foreign taste in fashion as she cares for men’s clothing. She presumably cares to make herself attractive to influential or wealthy foreigners that have been growing in numbers, as if dragged along by Al Mualim’s return. Malik is struck with his own frankness as he decides to share opinion.

“I’m more used to seeing you in dresses, Salai.”

The uproarious smile on Salai’s face drops to naught as she looks down the bodice and levels it out across her chest again in renewed examination. Malik has made a mess of the direction this exchange was supposed to take, but he would rather speak his mind than lie to Salai about this matter. He knows, by the contortion on Salai’s sharp face, that she knows his meaning, but she chooses not to address it as directly as Malik does. The affair gives Malik a nasty buzzying in the head, it upsets him that he is compelled into implicitly telling Salai that adapting to a more foreign type of clothing and conforming to the standard of foreigners in order to attract potential benefactors is playing a role she is not made for. Beneath the comely dress, Salai is a man. In his heart, he is a woman. It is how the community has known her. It is how Salai has been living for years. It is who she is.

A yell of Salai’s name barks from the adjacent room and they share a look. Salai conjures up her older self and nudges Malik towards the door with mischief plain across her face—to push Malik into the right direction or to evade her own duty, it remains unclear.

And Malik leaps right into a mess as he goes through the door to see Leonardo.

He combines the shreds of knowledge to remember the purpose of this invention, since they are as fickle and wayward as Leonardo’s appetite for discovery, and likely to drift into oblivion as Leonardo turns from one invention to another between tailoring and preparing herb medicines. A water pump, it is craftily called.

“Could you bring the—oh. Malik?” He concludes his ill-starred sentence. Malik offers a one-shoulder shrug and a curious look but Leonardo waves it off, “What prompts this early visit?” He slaps his stool, still warm, and offers seat. A tacit invitation Malik gladly embraces. He sits a while following Leonardo’s tinkering on the pump with a misleading look of curiosity and prompts himself into speech as he feels the first clutches of a yawn.

“The quilt you made me. I need it split into two halves.” Malik explains succinctly, watching Leonardo fastening the pipes onto the mechanism.

“The quilt presents no problem.” Leonardo waves it off in a slapdash tone, but he looks up from his crouching position and his gaze is anything but careless, “Tell me what does.”

Malik feels prodded all over by his gaze. He combines what’s left of his patience and what’s alive from his watered silence in response to Altaïr’s behavior from this morning, and holds silent. It’s not the answer Leonardo has aimed to extract. He winds up securing one of the wider, better-fitting discharge pipes with a sigh and drums his reddened fingers along its smooth leathery surface while he suffers through a brief thought.

“What you are doing invites calamity. He will retaliate.” Leonardo tells him at last.

Malik sets his chin into joined palms and leans onto his knees looking at the pump rather than the clear blue of Leonardo’s eyes, “What could he do to me what already hasn’t been done?”

“He could beat you. Rape you.” An expression of mockery asserts itself on Malik’s face at the latter proposition and Leonardo continues to lecture him, “His mind and heart have been touched by war, do not think him incapable of such a thing.”

Malik holds tongue even as he gives Leonardo’s first proposition a thought. He hadn’t truly considered the notion of Altaïr giving him a beating. He considers it, yet, somehow, even that seems as unlikely as rape by now. He doesn’t share his musings with Leonardo but the stark contrast to the possibilities he found imminent only two nights ago gives food for thought.

Leonardo sighs in response to his lack of talk.

“Should he prove too difficult to tolerate, remove yourself to some safer corner.”

“None exist. Not since he came to my house.”

“Malik.” Leonardo forces himself into Malik’s head, shuffles across the pipes to grasp his hands, and Malik lifts himself off to submit them to the man, “I know the way you breathe. The way you walk, or laugh, or sneeze. I know the child that spent nights hiding inside my bed and embrace. I know the tears that child had shed. I watched you grow up from a wounded boy into a young man of good probity.” Malik is stung into silence by the truth of all this, and stung deeper by Leonardo’s ensuing words.

“I helped you shift Kadar’s bones.”

There’s is a strain on Malik’s face.

He shuts his eyes but these memories fade with difficulty. The dirt on his hands extracting Kadar’s body bone by bone from dry earth will never wash away. The gritty thump of Altaïr’s shovel digging the first pit for Kadar’s body will never cease thudding inside his skull. Leonardo is cruel but his warm hands are gentle on Malik’s jaw pulling him away from the impetus of this sudden rush of memories. He doesn’t want to look at him, he can’t. Leonardo doesn’t press demand.

“After [Hiba](http://the-king-of-novices.tumblr.com/post/105028879746/live-forever-or-die-trying-the-pantheon-3-10)’s murder, what did [Ya’ar](http://the-king-of-novices.tumblr.com/post/114871631011/live-forever-or-die-trying-the-pantheon-6-10) do to appease [Nokem](http://the-king-of-novices.tumblr.com/post/104486337526/live-forever-or-die-trying-the-pantheon-1-10)?” Leonardo whispers retrieving him from the shudder of past.

Malik whispers back almost removed from thought, by letting his trained memory of the myth pour words into his mouth.

“To appease Nokem, Ya’ar aided in splitting off a chunk of Ga’ash’s mountain, where Hiba’s body lay trapped…” Malik’s whisper blends into the silence.

“And so they separated the mass of land to steal Hiba from his grasp.” Leonardo prompts, with thumbs drawing a constant path along his jaw.

“And Ya’ar grew a forest atop the mound of Hiba’s grave, the most ancient and sacred of our forests, to rid him of Ga’ash’s influence…”

And as [Ya’ar](http://the-king-of-novices.tumblr.com/post/114871631011/live-forever-or-die-trying-the-pantheon-6-10) once helped Nokem, so Leonardo once helped Malik. Helped unearth Kadar’s remains by night, helped steal down the volcano and across the fertile gap between the two hills that used to be one mountain—the entirety of Ga’ash—through its grain fields and orchards that are the mouth feeding the city’s belly, helped sneak up Hiba’s hill and into the ancient forest, helped bury the bones in a proper grave.

Malik opens his eyes and finds Leonardo’s thumbs still on his cheeks. The job of arguing against this man is a task he’s not made to do. But Leonardo owes him this favor, for having awakened a memory festering deep in mind, and deeper in heart.

 

* * *

 

Malik drags himself back home in such engaging confusion that he barely registers he has taken the slightly more revealing route across the courtyard instead of turning right, through the tunnel, and up the tunnel stairs towards home. He barely registers Altaïr having an exchange with a handful of elderly women or his husband’s morning company. He completely misses the dark figure that trails after him upstairs, and doesn’t notice even as said figure peeks through the door and into his kitchen as he unfastens his gloves—not the first person to peek into his kitchen during the past two days. He doesn’t notice until she utters an exceptionally amused:

“Greetings!“

“Greetings.“ Malik answers mechanically.

She grins and he scowls.

He knows her only in passing as the woman who has the same dark robes as he does, as if Malik shrugged it from his own shoulders and gave it to her, though clearly remembers never having done so—a knowledge supported by the fact that his own robes are folded neatly in the next room.

Malik’s gaze doesn’t flinch but his hands are not idle. He turns to his bread, takes a pinch of flour from his bowl and strews it across the counter to recommence kneading the dough. Her face is steeped in momentary seriousness before she glances at his bowl and shifts as if a smile has just been slapped on her face.

“Is that the southern kind? From Sheker’s market?“

Malik removes his eyes from her bright face to consider the object of this talk and it takes him a considerable amount of moments to grasp that she is for some reason referring to the flour.

“Yes. I prefer the city grain over foreign.”

She leans in with a conspiratorial zeal, although there is no one around, and he unwittingly shifts closer to her to hear the whisper first-hand.

“There’s even better domestic grain. Two stores down the one you bought this at. Behind the counters. Only whisper my name and you shall get it for a better price.”

Suddenly her smile feels huge and excitable and Malik is thrilled by this knowledge as much as with the feeling of slowly steeping into a new friendship.

“Who are you?” He asks while a smile nips at the corner of his mouth, pulling it up.

“I’m the [Masekha](http://the-king-of-novices.tumblr.com/post/106253964456/live-forever-or-die-trying-the-pantheon-5-9) of the city.”

“You equal yourself to a goddess?”

The fierce red of her lips stretches into a new smirk that strips him off the scowl, but he goes through watching this smirk uninterrupted. She offers to him not her hand, but her arm—a gesture far more intimate than acquaintanceship—and urges him on in spite of his floury hands. Malik sees no damage in this binding gesture, can’t see any mistake on horizon for accepting it, and he extends his arm to line it on top of hers and twists his wrist to grasp at her elbow as her fingers dig into his. She doesn’t mind the dusting of flour on her skin and her presence rings around him from all sides, and for a moment of this contact it feels as though they are conjoined through something more than sheer coincidence.

“Claudia Auditore.” She strips her mask at last.

“Malik Al-Sayf.” He seals the bond.

They hold onto each other’s elbows until the grip of fingers grows slack, but the bond lingers. Malik feels close to her for no rational reason. She is a noble. She is like Malik, and Malik like she. Though her family retained status and property, she is one of the handful remaining nobles yet breathing. For that alone, Malik feels connection to her.

“You don’t seem to hate me like your brother does.”

“You were but a child. Your will removed from all that happened that night.” She explains while she trails the tips of her fingers across the bony tip of his elbow, and had this gentle touch taken place before her words, Malik might have foolishly mistaken it for a flirt. Coupled with the guilt-ridden crease in her brow, he recognizes it for an overdue but well-received gesture of consolation, “I hold no grudge against you. Ezio spent too much time removed from home, given time to wallow in what he doesn’t know.”

Malik feels a pandemonium course through his body, from shock to elusive hope.

Malik’s thumb is hard-pressed into her inner elbow and he feels the jump of her tendon as she begins to slip out of their hold of arms, as if regretting having given her thoughts freedom, but Malik grasps her tighter and won’t give her arm room for retreat. He digs deep into her muscle, deeper than is comfortable, but his eyes are wild with thirst for knowledge.

“You do know?”

She holds his gaze absent fear of discovery, looks right into his hopeful eyes, but chooses silence over disclosure of secrets. Malik allows her to keep the answer to herself, however whetted his appetite for knowledge she seems to possess.

“I know the rumors say Al Mualim heard that only nine gods were worshiped, so he found it appropriate to add the tenth. Namely himself.” The humor on her face is thin and scrawny, a speck of dust too small to hold notice against the overwhelming implication of the joke.

“You know more than you show. Why do you smile then?” Malik whispers.

“Why do you scowl, little owl?”

 _To hide the pain of knowledge_ is his answer. Claudia smiles to hide the pain.

She hides knowledge because the mere fact of knowing doesn’t invite success. Anyone would be forced to hold those thoughts to themselves. Toss them into the sea and [Daga](http://the-king-of-novices.tumblr.com/post/105817154146/live-forever-or-die-trying-the-pantheon-4-9)’s fish will whisper the secrets, bury them to ground and see the forest whisper them into Ya’ar’s ear. Fighting cannot be done alone. Malik wants to give her shoulders a shake or take both her hands to give them a hard squeeze until she realizes she is not alone in desire to uncover the veil of lies that shroud their city. If she harbors such desire.

She slips out of their hold and this time, Malik allows it. This time, it’s an escape.

“Your husband might get ideas if I don’t return.” And she jests, smiles, puts on her mask, and retreats with a clear, cold glimmer of pain in her eyes.

Condemned are those privy to secrets.

 

* * *

 

“I see Sheker’s breath upon your necks, driving you to gossip.” Claudia adds after genially kneading into Desmond’s shoulder and settling on the portion of bench between him and Altaïr.

“It’s not the goddess driving us to gossip. It’s Ezio whining about his conquests.” Desmond cuts away the core of their conversation to present to her, “You have to give him advantage or the poor man’s ego will shatter into a thousand pieces.”

The object of conversation sits across the three of them, with mock desperation on face to bring Claudia’s proud grin to a standstill.

“We were talking about how my sister outnumbers me in lovers. I must keep up my reputation.” Ezio says shifting aside along the bench to evade the curtain of their combined frames obstructing his view. He keeps traipsing about the courtyard aimlessly until his gaze takes a trip to a man (against all odds Ezio did crave men on occasion and he spared them glances), a figure hauling what seems like a cylinder contraption with a corkscrew-shaped top and two protruding pipes dragging across pavement behind him. Ezio considers the apparatus before he considers the man, but when his gaze shifts course his attention is broken, and it feels as if his chest is filled with hot cinders.

The man hauls his machine towards the well and takes to untangling the leathery pipes. The sleeves of his scarlet tunic are already pulled up for this task, his hair—fair and gleaming in sun light—gathered into a ponytail equaling Ezio’s, the only difference being their length, with bangs put up and pinned to the crown of his head and a few of strands that managed to escape the bind of his pin loosely scattered across his forehead.

“And I will start this instant.” Ezio announces to the table company, and takes off.

The company of three is driven into twisting to look behind their shoulders, and it is Claudia who initiates and the two warriors who follow as they swirl around on the bench to watch the unfolding play.

“Watch him fail.” Claudia says and takes a swirl of their shared cup and knocks the rest of it down her throat while her sibling marches towards the well, chest puffed out and armor in place.

As Ezio approaches the lone figure at the well, he is subject to the endless selection of things he finds appealing on the man. He appears engrossed into his experiment, lowering a wide pipe into the water well, but Ezio hopes to rope him into a conversation.

It is hardly worthwhile pointing out that Ezio’s concept of conquering men who are difficult to approach let alone to conquer is no truer to the nature of things than Altaïr’s notion of marriage as a bond where the younger husband is flogged until he falls into obedience to his spouse.

And despite his displaced confidence, Ezio crosses the distance and shows himself into the crouching man’s personal bubble. Ezio parts his mouth to speak right as he is assailed by a perfumey scent, as if he just wandered right into a flowery forest. It must be the man’s clothes.

“Greetings.” Ezio says as he picks himself up from the sudden distraction.

The man doesn’t lift himself. He continues lowering the pipe into the well with a hand, looks him up and down, twists a loose lock of hair aside, and looks away.

Ezio’s focus begins to skip to and fro between the momentary impression of the pair of two clearest blue eyes and accepting this dismissal. The first impression of the man’s visage dims away and he settles into a stifling moment of reluctance.

“I am Ezio.”

The man looks up at him anew, then rises.

“Alright.” He retaliates with aloofness.

With a dawning dread, Ezio realizes that the man has looked at him like he found him a cheat, and, what is worse, an incompetent cheat, and Ezio sees the unmistakable possibility of failure dangling before him. Still, he continues seeing that words are expected of him as the one who initiated this flirt.

“Will you divulge your noble name?” Ezio tries with a more alluring tone, acknowledges the importance of making a good impression on the conquest. The man chuckles, and it’s a start.

“I am no noble. I stem from Gdila’s seed.”

Ezio listens poorly because the man's origin bears no meaning but he nods to encourage more words until he realizes he looks like he wants the man to look at him. He hopes he doesn’t look too desperate. It is fatal to look desperate, it makes the people want to dump you.

“And your name? Will you give it?” Ezio asks, and he sounds less secure about his making a move—deemed easy from the start—but nothing is lost as long as Ezio’s confidence is not too thin.

“If I find reason to.” The blond says in a more amiable tone and a more playful lull to his voice.

Ezio stops at the realization that his own selfish interest in this man precluded any conscious interest in the man’s person. He endeavors to form a coherent picture of this man, but the task eludes him. He appears a humorous, high-spirited man who has in him a strain of adventurous restlessness when piqued, and apparently this is his way of doing the business of flirting. Before Ezio concocts a response that would most likely appeal to this kind of man, the blond turns to his contraption pulling a cylinder rod out of the metal cask, and pushing it back into its former post—a task which requires muscle, and muscle Ezio does have in abundance.

“I can help with that.”

With a precarious lunge Ezio takes over in such a rapid impatient way that nothing good can come out of his impromptu assistance in an experiment he knows next to nothing of.

“I do this all the time, you wouldn’t know how—”

“Want to bet on that?”

Ezio grins with mischief, an act committed to impress the blond, and the circumstance which leads to this glorious mess is that this stately mechanism requires far less pressure than Ezio has been led on to believe. Ezio puts weight and muscle into the first push against the handles of the metal rod. The pipe whose other end is inside the well tears at the seams and bursts from the entry into the pump sending a terrific jet of water into Ezio’s unsuspecting face and down his torso, until his entire front is drenched and dripping wet and the pipe clatters to the pavement gushing with residual water.

The burst of Claudia’s hysterical laughter from the table is not loud enough to drown the noise of silence behind his back where the blond is doing gods-know-what and Ezio does not need to know what while he wallows in mortification. After a handful of moments of his absurd lowering the rod into its sheathe and leaning onto his knees in this less than elegant half-crouch, Ezio feels he should have slinked away into a hole by now while the man continues to pay no attention to him and Claudia revels in his failed courting with laughter that will later be replaced with sisterly affection to mop up his defeated spirits.

And every possibility points to failure as he waits for the man to leave after picking up the contraption Ezio has inadvertently destroyed—he is not sure if he should offer compensation though he would, given incentive, given any kind of spoken word by the silent man behind his back. Only the man materializes before Ezio and Ezio doesn’t look up but keeps leaning onto his knees and staring at the pavement since his pride couldn’t plummet any lower at this rate, and there are two fingers below his chin pulling him up.

The fingers linger even as Ezio rises to full height, they sweep Ezio’s drenched bangs aside with a wet brush before the man dabs the water on his moistened hand away across the front of his scarlet tunic, and all this he does not to annoy Ezio, but merely as an attempt to make him notice his presence.

His features have shifted into amusement bereft jeer and his lips are pulled into a smile of confidence Ezio secretly covets.

“Well this is unfair. You started before we could make bets.” The man says in a silvery voice, low enough to be intended for Ezio’s ears only, “You practically robbed me of easy coin.”

There is a beat of silence, and then:

“Name’s Leonardo.”

Ezio seems to Leonardo like the kind of man who would dodge any expression suggesting surprise after such a simple revelation, but Ezio doesn’t conceal it and the hopeful look on his face looks almost too pretty to shatter, but giving the warrior his name he did to anchor purpose of his ensuing invitation.

“I propose a walk,” Leonardo gives a smile and Ezio mirrors it with his confidence mounting slowly, slouchingly, as his hope runs a steady course until Leonardo’s next words, “I need someone to help me with the baggage from Sheker’s market. It’s way to the south and you look like someone who could carry a heavy load.”

To Ezio’s astonishment, Leonardo seizes him warmly by the arm. The hint of smile on Leonardo’s lip grows into a looped smirk as he feels along Ezio’s bicep, testingly, or teasingly, and Ezio feels the imprints in flesh long after Leonardo removes himself from his sight lugging his contraption off in the process. Ezio looks a bit disconcerted by the lack of touch and a couple of moments later, he stands listless and tongue-tied after this incomplete meeting.

Ezio discovers what it is to be hungry for attention.

 

* * *

 

The entrance to Barzel’s market is as gargantuan as Altaïr remembers it.

What he deemed an uneventful visit to the market (except for spending copious amounts of coin) he feels turning into admiration of the city’s beauty. Altaïr had been far removed from anything beautiful—if friendship and his armor are excluded. As it’s turning out, this visit to Barzel’s market is starting to invoke memories of a past time, and Altaïr doesn’t have difficulty in replacing old memories of it with the sight that lays before him and is about to broaden as he begins to pass through the entrance, pulled in by the jolt of activity.

Nothing has changed. The market still rests where they have left it, below the land-bridge connecting the inner city and the communities on the peninsula to the north, between the port to the right and the forum to the left. The barrel-vaulted entrance tunnel is still as vast as before, still teeming with people, and Altaïr watches the first signs of the inner space opening into the imposing interior of the roofed market as he moves through the jostling crowd of people towards the end of the tunnel.

Altaïr files into the vast open space of the market which drops in degree as soon as you enter it. It assails him all at once—the drop in temperature, the chatter of words that collide incessantly, the yelling and banging that break out at intervals, the ring of work and selling on all sides, the scented concoction of brimstone, tanning oil, dyes, fabric, steel.

It is a-few-breaths-worth expanse of time to get used to the sight that washes at him in waves pulling him into the sea of motion and bustle. He can hardly move a few steps without brushing against someone.

He strides across towards the center and, at last, he arrives before the colossal statue of Barzel.

Barzel’s market owes its name to the goddess of war and fire, the patron of blacksmiths. In the dead center of this round roof-covered structure is the statue of this goddess, standing with one leg perched over the body of a slain beast, with her flail—her beloved weapon—flung over her head in victory, seizing towards the very tips of her long braids tied with barbed knives. Her flail is a gigantesque weapon dotted with nine deliberately-spaced spikes—nine colorful stones instead of iron, each representing a different trade blessed by the goddess, each pointing to one of nine different corridors spread around in nine directions and reaching to a height sufficient for a small ship to fit inside.

Above the goddess, the rounded dome is climbing up towards the oculus in the center, a round-shaped opening at the top of the dome sealed with painted glass rather than left open for rain to drizzle through. The stained glass is tinged with entrancing amber, and as its yellowy light falls upon Barzel’s lifted hand—the one limb unburdened by armor—it appears as though it glows in fire. Altaïr’s neck strains from keeping his head tilted up as he soaks in the sight, feels like a speck of dust before this colossal statue, like a child watching the myth unfold in his mind’s eye as Barzel imbues Nokem’s lance with fire that he could spear Ga’ash’s exposed heart. Her other hand peeks from the cover of armor clutching a scroll—the eternal pact between the goddess of war and the god of death.

“One carpet one kesef! Three carpets for two! Three carpets for two, people!”

Altaïr’s stops reading the myth from the fiery light on Barzel's hand and the image grows into something remote as his senses turn to the sudden pitching of merchants around. They mingle with the crowd or dispatch their apprentices to do so, they mill around the statue circling about for customers to sway, they are big yellers and bigger sellers. At times there are bursts of two-three pitching bellows at a time, shouting of kesefs and coins, before they return to their shops and new merchants and artisans take their place.

From the statue in the center and spreading outward, colorful paths of cobblestone lead to each gigantic corridor. Some stones have been worn smooth by many soles, some still retain their coarse exterior. The layout of this entire market is like that of a blossom, with petals spread out in nine directions, but only barely avoiding touch with its yellow core in order to allow a circling path around Barzel’s statue in the dead center. Each of nine corridors—a number not waywardly chosen but matching the number of spikes of Barzel’s weapon—is flanked inside by shops of varying sizes, lined along the two walls providing a passage to walk along but not through as every corridor is a blind one, with a shop at its tapering tip marking its end. Which leaves one single entrance to this circular structure: where the tenth imaginary blossom petal ought to have been is not a blind corridor but the vaulted entrance tunnel Altaïr passed through. One entrance, unlocked. The shops, locked and bolted by night.

Altaïr knows why he is here.

His motives are triggered by his own desire. He has come to provide himself straw for his nest. To acquire goods to dress his home with coin Malik declined to use. In a relayed way, Altaïr has come to spend coin on what he hoped his husband would spend it on. He aims for all sorts of expensive commodities he could never afford before: pricey fabrics, fur, glassware and crystal, delicate things soft to touch or pretty to look at—as he once imagined his husband waiting for him. Altaïr wants a statue of Hiba. His dream of a welcoming household may yet prove possible, if he swerves his prayer from Gdila to Hiba, and his costly expenditure may soften Malik into seeing how he cares for embellishing their home with riches resembling those from Malik’s early childhood. Altaïr feels he had toiled long enough to finally be allowed to afford himself a taste of luxury, and Malik will come around by the time Altaïr bedecks their little nest in lavishness. Malik will mellow out. He will be keen on the gifts Altaïr will provide him with. They will be praying to Hiba together in no time. The gifts will not vouch for Malik’s anger anymore. All will be well.

With purpose renewed and spirits lifted, Altaïr draws near the stone slab spread out below the massive pedestal of Barzel’s statue and leans in to loom over the market map while bearing in mind the information gathered from two elderly women who pointed him to the right direction for obtaining the prettiest statue of Hiba, the softest fur, and finest fabric.

Altaïr examines the dark grey slab of marble encased in glass. The stone is ornate, with vines of copper and iron running along the rims, curling into one another like messy braids. Barzel’s market, unlike that of Sheker situated more to the south, is dedicated to the ‘still’, as the people are wont to call it—that is, all that does not decay and rot under sun. The carved image of corridors and their individual trades is on the marble, the legend marks which trade belongs to which corridor, from stonemasons to blacksmiths, tailors, goldsmiths. The marble is carved out to represent the entire plan of the market, with each corridor filled out with differently-colored little stones, each color representing another trade. Black for blacksmiths, gold for goldsmiths, white for jewel- and pearl-makers, purple for tailors, colorful for cloth-dyers—until the map is a mosaic of colors. This stone map is arrayed in a more orderly manner compared to the city marble map since each corridor is reserved for one trade (though it is said that many a merchant had sold their goods in corridors of other trades).

Altaïr has re-examined the city map prior to coming here. On it, he has seen the stone representing his husband.

The city marble map is on the main forum, erected on a massive stone encased in glass, locked, opened only upon need or request. The carved map is a small-scale rendering of the entire city—the two markets have their own at each individual location. Not every home of every community is carved out to be filled by a stone as not all citizens sell or trade or offer services. Yet many artists and tailors and healers are scattered across the entire city working from their homes. The marble map tells you where you can find whom, and the stones promote their skills—a jewel-maker could encrust their stone in gemstones to trumpet word of their skill, as long as the color of the stone remained to signify their trade. Some communities had no stones at all, some homes were taking up the space of two or three other homes around them to accommodate the number of different stones of individuals who do several trades at once.

Altaïr found but two homes in his community with stones inside. One of them was his own home. Malik’s and his. Altaïr had expected to find only a blue one for laundry work, but their home was expanded on the map to accommodate two additional stones—a scarlet one, and a grey one smartly etched with beautiful calligraphy. The other home was Leonardo’s, equaling in number of trades, from the purple one of a tailor to a green one of a healer. His third stone Altaïr could not decipher.

One person guards these marble slabs, holds key for the glass encasing, so that it wouldn’t fall victim to childish prank of upsetting the stones or to the weather or to theft. Should someone open a new shop, their home is carved out in the marble and given an appropriate stone. Should someone stop working within a trade, they would ask this person to unlock the map, remove their stone, and return it to them. Should someone start a new trade beside the existing one, they bring a new stone to add to their old ones.

Altaïr knows that Malik's calligraphy-covered stone stands for map-drawing, but he makes a mental note to inquire about Malik’s scarlet stone in the city map.

With Malik in mind, Altaïr sets off from the map of Barzel’s market, having committed desired path to memory. To a warrior used to the rusty brown of dirt and caked blood, the myriad colors around him is a pleasant shock to the eye, and needs getting used to. He keeps a lesser sack of coins belted at his front, keeps his hand across the coarse material feeling the weight of coins he is about to spend. The money is worthless in comparison to what desired results of its purchase would bring.

He sets mind to purpose and delves into the first corridor to the right (the brown stone) with fur traders. He immerses himself in the glassware corridor next, then into the territory of stonemasons in quest for a statue of Hiba, and into the realm of fabric traders at last. The merchants beset him from all sides, either with beckoning or physical gestures, having set keen eyes upon his sack of coins. Some take his armor as sign of a man seeking to part from his money like many other warriors who have been spending out spoils of war. Some are loud excitable men, some uncouth with a mouth equaling Desmond’s, some with flowery flattery putting Ezio’s to shame. Altaïr doesn’t mind their spasmodic pitching and vying for customers. He buys a collection of furs, fabrics of high value, for his own clothes and for Malik’s, and for the house. He buys a carpet. He feels less confident about this particular gain. It might not be on par with Malik’s tastes, and Altaïr has more talent for admiring than designing. He places most hopes in his acquisition of Hiba’s statue. This work of art is human-sized, carved from black granite which, though a stone less precious than the onyx of Malik’s Nokem statue, has the texture of its hands craftily varnished with a gilt of gold. This sculpture had cost him more than all other expenses combined, but the strain of this cost is relieved by the thoughts of what awaits him.

Altaïr orders for all these items to be delivered to his home.

By the time he brings current business to a closure, these items will find a way into his home, leaving him time enough to watch for Malik’s reaction to this big venture. With that thought meddling in his wayward step across the market, he wanders briefly into the blacksmith corridor, the one he had no use for presently, and he is unsure what pulls him from his wandering reflections first—the stuffiness of the blacksmith corridor which is abundant in heat deriving from their shops, or the all too familiar clashing sound of steel. Between the bladesmiths and blacksmiths, in the marked, ringed space allocated to testers of weaponry, two youths are having a friendly spar. The spot belongs to no one and everyone. Altaïr remembers having had one of his first lessons in sword on this loosely-fenced ring where sporadic sword lessons take place, where friends and foes settle differences, where bladesmiths demonstrate the quality of their weapons, where market crowds gather engaged in watching.

Altaïr spares but a few moments for this display, too innocent to be called anything else but toying with weapons, but it seems to have fetched a considerable crowd, and Altaïr falls into retreat as people start pressing him for space.

He gives a fleeting look into one of the shops nearest to the next corridor entrance but nothing beyond that, and he doesn’t see as the empty space is replaced by a merchant emerging from shadows. Altaïr is making to leave but a presence to his right makes itself known and he turns to find a fattish man, imposing in a secretive and furtive way, dressed in double-breasted tunic and smelling of scent. Altaïr scowls at him in a manner of asking his business but has no doubts this man must have seen his earlier lavish spending.

“Whatever you need, I shall provide.” The merchant tells him, his voice a hushed whisper but his face of animated secrecy. Altaïr has no need for whatever he is bent on offering, so he falls into walking again. The merchant trails after but doesn’t sidle up to his side as much as trots after him, almost breathing down his neck.

“You have a young wife?” The man tries, pursues even after Altaïr stops giving him notice.

“Or a young husband perhaps?”

Altaïr doesn’t halt. But he falters in step, a miniscule sign devoid of real attention to his body language, but enough for the man to seize the chance given. The next time he materializes before Altaïr, having to look up at the warrior because of height difference, he is awash with a wide smile Altaïr can’t decipher, and all in all, it is a complicated job to read enigmatic merchants.

“You want to dress him in fine clothes? Get hold of finest oil to enjoy your husbandly privileges? It’s not too expensive—”

“I owe no man.” Altaïr says, either as dismissal or haggle, whatever comes out of it.

“I ask not much in return,” the man assures, his hands surprisingly nimble as he pulls out a tiny, tiny bundle of cloth from one of his hanging satchels, “I got this fine clothing for a good price.”

The man nudges it into Altaïr’s belly and Altaïr looks down at it. No one gets cloth of this quality for a good price. The man is persistent, prodding Altaïr to have a closer look, and Altaïr takes the bundle for a better examination. The material is so silky, so smooth in texture, that it resists being held in place and folds out, though there is not much to see in terms of breadth.

Altaïr regards this clothing item as costly.

Between his fingers slips the pure luxury of finest fabric designed not to warm the flesh, but solely to please the eye. It is an expensive offering. One done for a spouse or a lover soon to become so. It’s delicately-wrought, a silken see-through fabric made to lure the observer into erotic temptation, made to entice lovers. Altaïr’s hands are dry and his callouses rasp coarsely against the silken, almost immaterial, fabric and he denies his rough hand touch by pulling away and leaving it in the hand of the merchant.

“One matbea.” The man announces as if deal is struck, wrenching Altaïr from a fantasy.

One matbea is a mind-boggling price for a piece of clothing this tiny. It’s a sum that arrests Altaïr’s sudden image of Malik in these shear pants caught in at the ankle, fine enough to be transparent, to lure him into what lay beneath. The price is too steep for a clothing item this insubstantial, however pretty. One matbea is what you would give for an excellent horse. The image of Malik in these pants bursts into his mind anew and he suffers a loss of strength and gives in.

“Five kesefs.” Altaïr offers. The original price cut in half. It’s bound to rise some, but he won’t allow himself thought of buying unless the price is lower than eight kesefs. The merchant’s face scrunches up for the briefest of moments—a hint enough to prompt Altaïr into repeating his offer at seeing the man doesn’t excel at haggle.

“Nine.” The man says, threads his thumbs through the prune trimming at the ankle of the pants as if to demonstrate to Altaïr the delicacy of the piece, one Altaïr is already convinced of.

“Six.” Altaïr says, fixed.

The merchant is hesitant and Altaïr is aware of this. The man glances around as if some other customer will crop up into their milieu, someone else he can follow around and pester about a pair of pants, but there is no one and both are growing impatient. Had the man been less easy to fall into reluctance, Altaïr might have refused the offer swiftly.

“Be quick, I will no longer linger in this heat.” Altaïr says short of snarl and he takes a breath filling his lungs and puffing his chest out in a show of dominance while they stand at the mouth of the hot blacksmith corridor. He wishes to hasten decision by mellowing the poor haggler out with threat of departure.

“Seven.” The man offers it for this lesser price only to entice further perchance, an expectation Altaïr doesn’t intend to fulfill.

Altaïr pays with seven kesefs from the purse grown tremendously lighter after all his purchases, and buys the delicate pants, wrapped into a bundle of different fabric and kept close to Altaïr’s chest, thinking that Malik will not refuse after seeing how pricey the gift is. He grows confident that Malik will find liking for it, for Altaïr has also bought the statue of Hiba to pray to now, and that is bound to give favored results.

 

* * *

 

Altaïr visits the nearest beach on his way home.

He intends to center his attentions on Hiba for the good of his marriage and household, and prayer to Hiba requires sand.

Hiba’s golden eye hangs low on the horizon ahead. Altaïr keeps the small bundle of gift to husband hot-pressed to his chest and lifts his right hand, extends it outwards to reach out for Hiba’s eye while its last gentle sun-rays lave at his body. A sliver more and the eye will set into the sea where [Daga](http://the-king-of-novices.tumblr.com/post/105817154146/live-forever-or-die-trying-the-pantheon-4-9) will accept it into her hold to guard it overnight. Altaïr catches its shape between thumb and index finger, like he used to do as a child, playing Nokem who once held Hiba’s retrieved eye thus, before he gave it to [Masekha](http://the-king-of-novices.tumblr.com/post/106253964456/live-forever-or-die-trying-the-pantheon-5-9) to make the sun out of it. He keeps his thumb in place and follows the sun’s languid sinking into the sea with the index finger, until his fingers are pinched together. There are silvery peals of laughter around the beach as the hour of beach worship comes to a closure, and families who came commence tidying up after themselves to return to their communities.

Altaïr used to worship alone as a child, however odd worshiping Hiba alone might have appeared to others. There were families who invited him into their circle at seeing a lonely little child worship, and Altaïr did once play in sand with other children, but he worshiped alone, hoping for a family to worship with when he grew old enough to marry.

Beach worship of Hiba entails a family venturing out for a meal on the beach, spending a day there if possible—for the adults, it is a custom for tying bonds between family, and for the children, it is a day for collecting gaudy little stones and shells to put on shoulders and pour sand down them. Altaïr hopes to one day worship Hiba on beach until a rose-hued sunset with Malik as family.

All around is dimmed with sunset as families leave moving past Altaïr, the dark is about to veil the city and prepare it for [Masekha](http://the-king-of-novices.tumblr.com/post/106253964456/live-forever-or-die-trying-the-pantheon-5-9)’s nightly arrival. Altaïr wonders how many children will be up tonight, peeking through their windows in endeavor to hear the four-headed goddess galloping around the city on her horse, in robes dark as the night, slipping into every street to bring moonlight to every corner of the city. Altaïr had never heard her. Ezio swears on his life he did. More than once. Altaïr believes him. There have been people who have heard but not seen the goddess at night. She is too cunning to be beheld with bare eye.

Altaïr falls into a crouch and fixes the little bundle into his lap. He takes a sack he had acquired earlier at Barzel’s market and begins filling it with fine, dry sand. He takes as much as he deems enough for a few days of prayer to Hiba. He lets its weight sink into his palm and washes in the stillness of the beach, breathes the scent of sea that waves in the wind, listens to the gentle lashing of waves upon sand. The darkness has gained in hue when he next looks up and around.

Altaïr is still crouching and blending in with the mixture of sand and sea ahead when he catches glimpse of a cave far to his left. It’s one of [Daga](http://the-king-of-novices.tumblr.com/post/105817154146/live-forever-or-die-trying-the-pantheon-4-9)’s sacred caves. Only couples are allowed to go inside to perform the sacrifice to Daga, the goddess of fertility. The mermaid that was born human. Access to the cave is barred by sea now due to high waters, but when the first clean night comes, there won’t be water and the path leading into the cave will be dry. Altaïr knows about the sacrifice. In theory, he knows every miniscule detail. In practice, he never had a partner to perform it with, though he craves Malik’s company in it now, as the only other person he could perform it with. Altaïr had been privately assured that Ezio had done it before, until Ezio confessed that he had not. He did not give reasons. Altaïr knows Desmond had never performed it either.

The thought of making a sacrifice to Daga simmers low in Altaïr’s belly until he yearns for it. It seems inaccessible for a moment, as barred a possibility as the current entry to the cave, too distant to ever reach within a lifetime. But as he presses the bundle of wrapped clothes to his burning belly a sudden change comes over him. The set of his shoulders alters, all burden on hope and desire unloads, drops off in an instant. His mind glides over the possibility of shortening the distance between him and his husband.

Malik yearns to see revenge enacted. He desires the scales of justice to be balanced by equal amount of spilled blood. Altaïr is eager enough to speed up the process of drawing Malik into his embrace to spill blood as gift to his husband. He can’t bring harm upon his Master. The thought is too removed from Altaïr’s heart to even consider such notion. But he feels an upwelling of a different, sinister train of thought.

Altaïr is game to kill Abbas. In exchange for Malik’s trust.

He can’t offer Al Mualim’s life, but he feels little qualm about presenting Abbas’ head to Malik as a sweetener. Altaïr would stain his sword with blood to have their breaths mingle inside one of Daga’s caves.

Altaïr stares off towards the cave he can barely see, raring for blood as much as he is raring for his husband’s touch.

With resolve cemented, Altaïr takes off.

 

* * *

 

Their home smells of fresh meal and commotion when Altaïr arrives.

On their table is a piece of bread and table condiment and leftovers of what looks like a sophisticated meal of veal escalope in a sauce mixture—Malik’s abandoned dinner.

The first room is in a sort of delirium.

And Malik is very near it. The essence of the situation is that a dozen of people are charging back and forth through the narrow passage of bodies and collisions, and yells of carriers hauling in the heavy carpet, thick rolls of furs, bundles of fabric wound around bulky spools, crates of polished brasswork, spotless glass- and silverware Malik had nowhere to store—a Barzel’s market in small inside their house.

Malik is struggling through this beside half a dozen of orders that are still pending and at the same time a man is following him around and making trouble about the placement for the statue while Malik is arguing with the hauler trying to set the carpet across the table. Malik looks like he could bang a few heads together for rage and then he is standing there in the midst of this whirl of motion looking vaguely confused and distinctly angry at having his home disturbed by these objects. He is too torn leaping to and fro between a multitude of haulers and sorting information to notice Altaïr’s presence. Altaïr slips through to join his husband inside and settles at his side to wordlessly announce his presence.

Malik has only a moment to look at him before the orders stop and the grand turmoil falls into quiet. Everything stops very suddenly. This foldup of activities is brought about by Altaïr’s appearance.

Another few moments of tumult start as the carriers pick themselves up and the pandemonium boils down to nothing after they leave with appreciative quips and invitations to further purchase in future.

“Can we afford such commodities?” Malik asks with a stretch of concern in his aggravated tone and his voice warms Altaïr’s mood, he has missed it despite the short span of time since last hearing it.

“I want the best for this house. Silk and fur. Glass and statues.”

“We need no embellishments.” Malik says assuming a bizarrely gentler tone—an occurrence that, linked with Malik’s sudden proximity as he comes to stand before Altaïr, almost drives the warrior to picking Malik up off floor into an embrace. But Malik stands there looking up at him and concern is shifting across his face and morphing into frustration.

“We need spices and food to store, and linen and pottery and grain. Oils and soaps, not luxury.”

Altaïr only now realizes that what he read as a gentle voice is in truth a lecturing tone made lower but firmer so that Altaïr would pay attention and receive the message properly.

“Money slips through your fingers like sand, you’ve no sense for keeping a household.” Malik chides.

Malik is bitter. He is not happy. He is not satisfied. Altaïr’s visions are dissolving.

“Dinner is in the kitchen.” Malik says as form of dismissal, as if his sudden, ungrateful departure doesn’t send the lesson across. Altaïr watches him gather up his uneaten meal and setting it aside inside the kitchen. He watches him walk out of the house he worked hard for to acquire, and even harder to embellish. Yet the embellishments are nothing absent his husband’s light.

 

* * *

 

Altaïr is not discouraged enough to put off praying to Hiba. It may yet bear fruit.

The statue he has moved into their bedroom, set it into the space beside Nokem, so that the two brothers can be in each other’s company. As Altaïr gazes into Nokem’s face, his visage appears less threatening, less menacing than the last time he looked at it. He brings his sack of sand and a blanket to spread before Hiba’s statue.

Altaïr’s torso is bared.

He adjusts the sack before him, unlaces the string keeping it tied, takes a handful of warm sand. He bends his neck and lowers head in worship and keeps his hand positioned above his shoulder, soldered into a fist keeping the sand trapped. As the first thoughts begin to form in mind and words see them whispered to Hiba, Altaïr begins to loosen his fingers, slowly, deliberately, pouring the sand down his shoulder and arm. The sand keeps dusting down his limb gathering around his cross-legged form and across the blanket. He prays in hope of love to come. He beseeches, pleads for his household to be imbued with laughter and sated with his husband’s care and affection.

Altaïr keeps strewing the sand down his shoulder in a playful sprinkle, to emulate what Hiba was doing when he first arrived home. This toying with sand is a libation to the god, a way of connecting intimately enough to talk to him and ask favor.

Altaïr asks for favors because he can’t hear the god whisper to him as Malik claims he hears [Nokem](http://the-king-of-novices.tumblr.com/post/104486337526/live-forever-or-die-trying-the-pantheon-1-10). As [Gdila ](http://the-king-of-novices.tumblr.com/post/104486350666/live-forever-or-die-trying-the-pantheon-2-10)whispered to him before battles. He wishes Hiba would tell him what he doesn’t know, but the god is silent and Altaïr keeps dusting the sand across his arm in reverence and hopes for a welcoming household despite the quiet.

He doesn’t know that Malik considers his gifts a waste of money—not because they stem from Altaïr, but because his knowledge of keeping a household far exceeds that of Altaïr’s and he recognizes waste. He doesn’t know that, while he did refuse the spoils, Malik is bitter about Altaïr’s lightened purse. Malik can’t provide for them both during winter if Altaïr spends his entire sack of coins within a week of returning. He doesn’t know that Malik’s mind doesn’t wander into gratitude at Altaïr’s vain attempt to fill the many gaps with gifts, as if nothing has happened in the seven years that spanned between their first meeting and now. Like the holes could be stitched with coin.

Altaïr knows nothing of this, but he prays on and he is in the process of pouring his third hand of sand when Malik returns.

He strolls into the bedroom fresh out of the courtyard’s showers, and it's a comely look of a youth with skin awash with droplets, a white bath sheet folded around his waist and hips, with fresh face and sleek black hair. An image that Altaïr misses due to prayer. Malik slips his new nightclothes on while Altaïr is praying—the old design altered to suit his current needs—and then he imposes himself on Altaïr by proximity, looming behind his back as he stares at the atrocity of Altaïr praying to Hiba. He humbly waits on this inappropriate distance, for a time, but then breaks the prayer through spoken word, in a manner Altaïr is guilty of.

“I hear you whisper to Hiba. Do you believe he heeds your prayers?” Malik borrows Altaïr’s own words from this morning, with an excess of mockery in tone.

Altaïr avoids confrontation or doesn’t acknowledge Malik’s interruption. Malik watches him pray, with distaste, finding that his husband is unworthy of addressing the god of family and household, finding zero reason why someone like Altaïr would pray to such a meek god to begin with. The whole affair of finishing the prayer lasts several moments. Malik hails Altaïr’s abnormal silence because he finds it more welcoming than words, and he doesn’t ruin Altaïr’s packing up. The warrior rolls the blanket up to dust off tomorrow, ties his sack, and as Malik is making to leave for bed, he notices Altaïr thrusting a small bundle into his hand.

Upon seeing Malik’s cross look, Altaïr gives his throat voice.

“I got this fine piece for a good price.”

Malik keeps a suspicious eye on him but unfolds the bundle by digging his fingers into crushed velvet of this item and allowing it to unfold before his eyes as he straightens it up with both hands. No one gets fine materials like this for a good price. Two pant legs spread out, caught in at ankles, dyed an expensive purple, hiding _nothing_. Altaïr has brought him what is felicitously called ‘the gift to lovers’. Anger is stripped off Malik's face and replaced by heavy confusion.

“I won’t wear this. It’s made to entice partners.” He realizes with puzzlement, incapable of caring for anything that revolves around incentives of sexual pleasure. It is an investment misplaced, though the fabric could yield some gain if sold, which made Altaïr’s clumsy acquisition less damaging. Malik considers the price it would fetch when sold, considers if the recompense would be large enough to cover the expenses spent on this, when suddenly the shift in Altaïr’s face draws his attention as he catches glimpse of it through one transparent pant leg.

Altaïr has the gall to drop gaze to floor and allow his face a furtive, coy smile. When Malik still remains oblivious to the subtle hints of this display, Altaïr moves to bolder words.

“Well... yes. I was hoping you would wear it.”

And the full realization of Altaïr’s intention—so clear but made obscure by Malik’s innocence—plummets upon him driving him into a dark-faced fury.

“ _Fuck_ you!”

He feels he should snarl some more at the idea of making himself more attractive for Altaïr by wearing this gift but finds his body carrying him towards the bed where he drops down with an angry, energetic pulling of quilt over his form, and turning to the side facing inwards to the bed to avoid looking into his husband’s face until the man assumes his place in bed, whereupon he plans to roll over to fit himself into the position he’s been forced into since Altaïr’s arrival.

Altaïr remains, with the gift worth seven kesefs spilled at his feet. He feels his gorge rising, and a tide of dark, hellish anger, his common civility turning frail as he watches his husband, intolerably insolent and tucked into the bed, until his fists tremble with want to be used. An anger which ends, somewhat disappointingly, in growing slack and sloppy. Malik remains stony and hardhearted. To have him but not have him is a curse beyond repair.

“I was woken from a fleeting dream.” Altaïr whispers hoarsely, as if to himself, as if not expecting words in return.

“Every night breaks, and we must wake,” comes a desired voice, in half-desired tone, and undesired answer.

Altaïr’s chest is hurting. It’s a sudden shift in the way he feels physical pain. It’s not the stab of blade or arrow, not the flesh parting beneath sharp weapon but heart splitting with the revelation of being unwanted. Unwelcome. Undesirable. Not once during his childhood in Hiba’s orphanage did he feel this discarded by another human being. His initial impulse was to punish Malik for injury inflicted. To retaliate against the agony of rejection, until he starts telling pains apart to find it not of flesh but of sentiment, undeserving of retaliation with violence, as it would only serve to further severe what is left. It would serve to cut bonds between him and the community. All would take Malik’s side if he were to punish his husband with savage violence. They would tear him apart.

Altaïr has a prodigious memory of what he receives when he lashes out at Malik. They will never budge from the spot they loiter at while Altaïr keeps retaliating in response to Malik’s anger. Altaïr has learned his lesson. Now he means to balm wounded heart with last attempt of getting closer to his dream of peace in household.

He entombs his anger for good and circles the bed, slipping into it from his side. Malik has not yet fallen victim to slumber but to a dark scowling instead, and as Altaïr climbs into the bed without slipping beneath the quilt, Malik flips over to face away.

“I seek no quarrel.” Altaïr assures, softly.

“Your presence around me states otherwise.”

The knowledge of Malik’s discomfort is difficult, but Altaïr hopes to approach the lofty halls of peace through a different route and teaches himself patience before he speaks.

“I know there have been tensions between us. Yet I see no cause for our current arrangement to fall into unpleasantness,” he says short of whisper, and it would be amusing to watch Malik’s face in response to words that are probably unexpected, “Let us lay our mistakes past us or find them repeated.”

Malik is holding silence evasively.

Altaïr’s mind is scattered across all the words he wants to utter and things he wants to do, but his body manages, somehow, by dint of intuition and a kind of natural bounce of attraction, to slink across the quilt and closer to his husband. Once he is within a breath of distance, he gives life to the dark thoughts that have been birthed at the beach.

“I cannot give you Al Mualim’s life. Whatever else you wish for, give voice to desire and see it satisfied.”

From his angle, Altaïr can’t see the slant of Malik’s face, but he hopes to nudge him into asking for Abbas’ death to even scales of justice and see his family avenged. Malik is stubbornly silent and doesn’t allow a glimpse into his wants. For yearning of coming even closer, Altaïr is pressed into suggesting it himself.

“I may find means to kill Abbas, if that will please you.”

Altaïr’s whispers of a deserved death suffuses Malik with amazement that makes his tense shoulder fall slack and his grip on the quilt loose. Loose enough for Altaïr to grasp chance and slip it down his husband’s shoulder and partly down his flank as he scoots up to slot himself in. He yearns to wind his arm around him and draw him against his chest, but he awaits answer, a green light to carry on with touch.

“If you hold means, kill that son of Ga’ash.”

Malik is aloof but aloofness alone is not enough to discourage him. His mind is far from sexual gratification and wanders around the territory of easy touching and affection as he hooks a finger into the wide neck of Malik’s nightclothes to draw it down his shoulder and set mouth to work, a reward he thinks is well-deserved after the promise of blood. Bliss has taken him into its hold as Malik doesn’t utter a sound of protest and his path is cleared. Altaïr’s heart has not opened wide enough to allow himself thought of a night spent in this proximity, but he hopes to hold his husband for at least a while. He peppers a collection of kisses—wet and dry and wispy and well-pressed—until he has no corner left to kiss that his lips haven’t touched. Through fleeting advantage he glides his hand down Malik’s flank, across his ribs and down towards his waist where he bumps the quilt away to settle lower, on his hip. He feels the intricate pattern across Malik's side through sense of touch before his gaze joins to gorge itself on this display.

The knots are falling down his left flank in an orderly line of five. Between the knots are gaps. He allows his hand to part from Malik’s hip to sweep across the two lowest knots, the nearest, pressing harder along the gaps to permit his fingers access to the warm skin resting beneath. His fingers are rough from callouses and he fears his touch is not as soft as he had intended, so he pulls himself a sliver down Malik’s back to replace fingers with lips. He nudges the first slit apart with the tip of his nose and lays lips to a rest upon patches of bare tan skin that peeks from the pristine white fabric and pretty knots.

Malik is going along with it.

Altaïr is torn between wanting to decipher his motives and wanting to dive down every gap to brush lips upon every spot of exposed skin and drain his thirst for touch, and the latter rises as the victor, at least for a while of muddled sanity. Malik smells of washing soaps and mild clean scents, and fine fabric, and baked bread. It’s the scent of home Altaïr yearned to return to after war. And if he died here this instant, it would be in the elusive embrace of a dream, and it’s a better death than the biggest glory upon battlefield.

After every gap between the knots has been appropriately attended to, Altaïr pulls himself up to former position with a blend of joyful moan and contented sigh—an odd noise of bliss, a stranger to his own throat—and coils an eager arm round Malik’s form, finding it tense. He props himself up on elbow keeping his other hand around his husband, and tilts his head over Malik’s shoulder to peruse his face. He appears disconcerted by his touch, and a couple of beats later, Altaïr is able to read the single most violent expression from the shape of his sneer, which is a screaming _back off_.

Altaïr feels as all his excitement seeps away, leaving behind a dreadful sadness, an emptiness that feels as violent as Malik’s hostile expression, as if he’s been gouged out and left a carcass. Altaïr is not even near to rubbing up against him in base desire, he has wrapped himself around Malik’s body in nothing that could indicate sexual pursuit or appetite, it is a completely innocuous attempt at fastening them closer to each other.

The problem of his relations with Malik is that he needs a laborious amount of time to have his heart mended in his presence, and an appallingly brief moment to have it cracked open by the same person that held means to sew it shut.

His chest feels inhumanely carved out with nothing but bones left inside.

In this grisly sight of Malik’s inhospitable visage, he feels as if his body has been stabbed into movement and retreats with a gaze lost and moving around wildly, until it settles on the middle of their bed. Something is different about their bedspread. The quilt looks split apart, and Altaïr picks the corner of Malik’s supposed half and finds it unstitched to his own, two halves torn apart, and the salt of Malik’s action rubs into his open insides and drives him to nausea. A villain in his own house. A border put up between them. As if they haven’t moved on at all but reverted a few steps back, to worse than it has been before.

Altaïr falls to his back pressing the heels of his palms to his eyes and cheeks, forcing them down until it feels like his skull could give in under the pressure and crack open like his chest—a pain that’s welcome against the upwelling of what Altaïr suspects is a breakdown as he vows never to cross Malik’s side of bed again.

He lunges from the bed and his body carries him across the room in surprising sense of direction, he throws on the first piece of cloth that fits him, prepares to leave.

“Where are you going?” Malik grumbles from bed.

“I have pressing concerns.” Altaïr forestalls emotion that threatens to ooze into his voice, appears more coldhearted than heartbroken.

“Of what sort?”

Emotion leaks faster into his tone and Altaïr has to keep himself from speaking before his voice feels ready to be used, “I would not have my presence dampen your spirit,” he spits, takes a breath of mercy, sucking on the remaining shreds of poise in him, “We should be kept separate. Throwing us together in one pit invites calamity.”

Malik’s face is small and inscrutable, the portion of it that’s peeking from the shield of his quilt. He says nothing, offers no insight into his thoughts. Unreadable, like from the first moment Altaïr returned to set eyes upon him. Reserved. Unwelcoming. Detached. Altaïr desires him. Despite his shortcomings, regardless of flaws, even with his snotty reserve. Altaïr wants him. He had allowed his affection recognition and food. And found it severely underfed by the boy that lies wrapped in his cocoon, on their bed.

Malik’s deep, dark eyes follow his departure, a sorry exit marred by a bitter confession.

“I cannot remain within these walls and be denied your touch.”

Altaïr leaves, swallowed by night.

The door swings shut behind him.

 

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Please tell me who you want to top in EzioLeo (for when the time comes). It doesn’t matter to me, but if there's some preference among EzioLeo readership, then give it voice and help me decide in advance.


	4. Chapter 4

**Notes for the Chapter:**

>  **Please be warned that some parts of this chapter may be disturbing. Read with caution.**  
>   
> 
> Reminder of what we have:
> 
> Malik = [Nokem](http://the-king-of-novices.tumblr.com/post/104486337526/live-forever-or-die-trying-the-pantheon-1-9) (solved by [the_one_from_the_forest](http://archiveofourown.org/users/the_one_from_the_forest/profile))  
> Kadar = [Hiba](http://the-king-of-novices.tumblr.com/post/105028879746/live-forever-or-die-trying-the-pantheon-3-9) (solved by [the_one_from_the_forest](http://archiveofourown.org/users/the_one_from_the_forest/profile))  
> Altair = [Gdila](http://the-king-of-novices.tumblr.com/post/104486350666/live-forever-or-die-trying-the-pantheon-2-9) (solved by [tanzende-wasserspeier](http://tanzende-wasserspeier.tumblr.com/))  
> Ezio = [Daga](http://the-king-of-novices.tumblr.com/post/105817154146/live-forever-or-die-trying-the-pantheon-4-9) (solved by [Moondreamer](http://archiveofourown.org/users/Moondreamer/pseuds/Moondreamer))  
> Desmond = Zikaron (solved by [westerbroski](http://westerbroski.tumblr.com/))  
> Leonardo = [Ya'ar](http://the-king-of-novices.tumblr.com/post/114871631011/live-forever-or-die-trying-the-pantheon-6-10) (solved by an anon)  
> Lucy = Sheker (solved by [annyfranny](http://annyfranny.tumblr.com/))  
> Claudia = [Masekha](http://the-king-of-novices.tumblr.com/post/106253964456/live-forever-or-die-trying-the-pantheon-5-9) (solved by [westerbroski](http://westerbroski.tumblr.com/))  
> Rauf = Barzel  
> Al Mualim = Ga'ash (solved by [whats-the-bizness-yeaah](http://whats-the-bizness-yeaah.tumblr.com/))

 

Malik practices restraint when stepping out of home at early hours.

A curbing of recklessness made necessary by the fact that Malik is oftentimes an inadvertent participant in a quaint little custom going by the name of ‘an offering to Hiba’. That useful restraint is what makes him examine the doorstep a moment before he is to set foot upon it. This early morning, on the doorstep sits a small bundle Malik immediately recognizes as an offering to Hiba—a practice he did not participate in for quite a time, one that puts a smile on his face as he bends to take the bundle. It fits into his palm.

It’s been a couple of weeks since someone shared an offering with him. Longer still since he himself initiated one.

It rests in his palm warming his skin. Whoever made it has left the offering here only moments ago. He unwraps the piece of clean cloth and finds the ball of sweet bread, wonders quietly what’s inside. The ball alone won’t reveal to him the identity of the baker, but he is victim to steady attempts of trying to puzzle it out by tasting its contents. With a smile unwavering on face, Malik re-wraps the ball to keep the offering warm until he can share it with someone and he carries on with intended path, descending into the vacant courtyard.

The truth is, gentle Hiba cares for more than only the household. His care extends exceedingly towards ties of friendship and community.

When someone requires blessings from Hiba for small ventures—those unfit for sacrifices or blood blessings—they rise with first light to bake these balls of cake to spread among community members most dear to them, to leave them at front of doors, anonymously, before the people of their choosing leave homes, so that they may find it upon waking. As the honored receiver of this little offering (as Malik is at present) a person has no means to divine the identity of the one who left the sweet treat at their door. No means, unless they try to guess by the taste of its dough, or the sweet filling inside, or unless they happen to stumble out of home early enough to catch someone in the act. Malik once disturbed Leonardo in mid-offering, and their jolt of mutual surprise dissolved into a jelly of unbecoming giggles as they split that winter morning with laughter.

As a child, Malik once wondered why the baker should not reveal their identity if they made effort to bake the offerings before sunrise, to steal out at first light and leave the sweets at people’s doors. He cared not for asking elders for answers, until the answer revealed itself to him on its own. As a child, Malik recognized the importance of anonymity in this offering. The identity matters little. It is an honor to be included in this offering to Hiba, and by making identities obscure the bonds within community grow stronger. It could be anyone. The mere fact of knowing that other members of community care for you prompts return of this care and strengthens ties between people. As a child, Malik understood, as all children are bound to understand at a certain point, that nothing is as treasured, or as valuable, as the sanctity of community.

The hour is early.

The peace of the courtyard beckons Malik to enjoy the quiet despite the reason behind his early waking being not wasting a second between two jobs today, and even though he is hopelessly behind with the work (Altaïr being the main culprit for his putting off of duty) he resolves that he will pull through even if he spares himself a moment of peace to enjoy the unexpected offering.

Malik is about to snatch himself a seat at the lone bench when his gaze unmistakably lands on the most disgraceful display of the day—a wine-sodden spot on pavement at the foot of the massive table that is the residence of two warriors who have drank themselves senseless.

Of all the places and events that flitted through Malik’s head last night—including drowning in sea (a more favorable image) and sharing the bed of someone else (for some reason a less favorable image)—Malik has woken to find his husband a wine-drenched fool cuddling up to Desmond on naked floor. Wine flasks are abundant around them, most long emptied, and the sight is a sorry one to behold. His empathy for Altaïr is trying to stifle itself with varying degrees of success, but his empathy for Desmond is indisputable. The poor man has somehow managed to not only get involved in the failures of Altaïr’s marriage, but also to provide to Altaïr a body for holding he so desperately needs. The latter Malik suspects to be not so much a result of a consenting effort as a side effect of a drunken bout. Desmond is most probably not even aware that someone is holding him.

Malik rolls his eyes—a motion that morphs into a shake of head born from his rupture of annoyance which is marred by a relief Malik chose neither to acknowledge nor to address—and then he takes his intended seat and unwraps his offering, with the two benumbed warriors snoring gently at his right.

Malik knows what he is supposed to do with the offering.

Upon receiving the ball of cake, a person is meant to split it in half. One half to preserve for themselves, the other to be offered to someone else, so that this offering to Hiba can be further shared and the circle of people involved spread to strengthen the blessing. Malik’s duty is to share. And while he would gladly offer the other half to Desmond, the warrior is dead to the world, dead to three of Altaïr’s limbs tightly coiled around him while they doze a three-steps-distance away from Malik. At least the night has given them clement weather that they would not freeze sleeping on pavement. At least Altaïr didn’t stray into someone else’s bed. The latter is relevant only as far as the strength of his husband’s given word extends, as proof that he would honor promise of faithfulness even in a drunken state of a man forced from his bedroom by the impact of a rejection. He is still true to his word.

Malik heaves a sigh and lifts his feet onto the bench to settle into a cross-legged sit as he traces with a blunt nail along the groove running around the ball, indented before baking to ease splitting of cake into two halves. He presses in until the texture of it begins to crumble under his nail and the ball gives in to intent and breaks off in half. He dusts the crumbs away and holds the two identical pieces, examines its content for clues that could point to the baker, ponders on who to honor with the other half of the offering. Inside is a filling of peach jam and chopped hazelnuts and Malik’s mouth waters with whetted appetite. It’s been a while since he pampered himself with indulgence in sweets—an error that requires prompt correction as he promises himself a dessert for midday meal.

He gives himself over to pondering about cake recipes, for only a short moment which drops off in an instant when the first little bird plummets to peck at a crumb and swishes past. He blinks himself awake from contemplation and finds the next two, then three, then a collection of songbirds feasting on the crumbs that escaped to pavement. He cuts his own state of confusion short with a chuckle, cares not if he will wake the warriors with the sound, and at last settles on whom to share his half with. His own half he deposits onto the wrapping, into his lap, and proceeds to hollow out the filling from the half he intends to share. He scoops the jam and hazelnuts out, licks it off his finger, and grinds the half into crumbs to spread among the gathered company. He is deliberate in his distribution and takes care to offer equal chance for meal to each bird as he dusts pinch after pinch down across pavement where the tiny beaks are pecking for crumbs.

Beside him, there is suddenly a rush of a warm moan that sails across the distance from Altaïr’s mouth to Malik’s ear like it’s meant for him, and it is.

“ _Malik_...” The gruff, earnest, pleasant moan mumbles from Altaïr’s mouth while he makes a desperate dash to draw Malik’s body closer, an attempt made absurd by the fact that he is fastening himself to Desmond’s back instead to the body of his husband who watches this display of misery. The tight clasp on his body, the face burrowed into his nape, the clammy breathing down his neck, all shake Desmond from remnants of sleep and Malik is privy to the shift of expressions on his face as the warrior starts to his senses at a rapidly growing speed. Desmond doesn’t shake Altaïr off but he takes the luggage of Malik’s heavy gaze with more bravery than Malik had expected him to.

“Altaïr, I’m afraid you’re shit out of luck,” Desmond rasps with a hoarse voice and wriggles out of the loosening grasp, “I know everyone wants me but I’m not the one you’re calling...”

Desmond is righting himself into sitting and stretching the kinks from his cramped muscles, and Altaïr lies in shambles behind him, on his back, with hands shielding eyes that refuse waking. Altaïr takes his drink with far less expertise than Desmond. He hears him shuffle towards the table, towards the bench, and he listens to his antics feeling a distant shame at having entangled Desmond into the side effects of his bitter marriage. He opens his eyes at last despite contempt for light, and his gaze lands not on Desmond but, surprisingly, on Malik who is for some reason sitting cross-legged on the bench and feeding a cohort of birds. Altaïr has never seen him in a comelier state nor healthier shade of skin or fresher face which proclaims how restful his sleep was without a husband at his side, while Altaïr dragged himself through the night with a company of three—Desmond, drink, and sorrow.

Altaïr’s unfortunate position on the ground offers to him a fortunate (or equally unfortunate) glimpse through the gap between Malik’s flank, arm, and knee where he’s leaning his elbows on, and right into his lap where the warrior, upon closer inspection, discovers what is the leftover of an offering to Hiba. This feeding of songbirds gains another dimension, one of blatant disregard for actual family, one that Malik unashamedly flaunts before Altaïr’s very nose.

There sits a husband who faces away in bed, disregards when he’s not hurling words of disobedience or refusing to include him in an offering to Hiba. Warriors disbanded, no husband, no family. Altaïr has awoken to a world of shit.

The moment of watching Malik feeding birds with what he was expected to share with him is squalid and uncomfortable, hurts far more than the hangover. Nausea crawls over his insides and climbs up his throat and he leans forward catching his inner elbows at his bent knees and fastening a hand on the wrist of his other hand, and he tightens himself closer during the drumming vertigo at the front of his skull. His body is cold but the chill creeping up from the stone below is putting it to shame.

He catches Malik looking at him furtively.

Altaïr ties the disappointment on his face so that the holes in his heart don’t show, or at least so that they don’t show too much.

If Malik understands anything from the wrinkles on his face Altaïr doesn’t know, but he sits on ground with Desmond watching him in pity while he, in turn, watches as Malik gives away the last crumbs of what he was supposed to share with him. He sits there in drags and a haggard face and heart left hollow after the wine was drained from it, watching the birds feast on what should have found way in his mouth and heart instead. He suffers the torment of hunger—not for food but for husband—and his craving for Malik seems not to have grown thinner overnight.

This botched offering to Hiba weighs heavy on him until the point of crushing, until his capacities for hope are draining faster than yesterday.

Malik unwinds and hops from the bench to wash his hands at the well.

“I wish I never married,” Altaïr says thoroughly sodden with regret, to himself or to Desmond, “My home would be empty. But absent this entanglement.”

From the table doesn’t come as swift a reply as he had expected but he doesn’t turn to watch Desmond fidget and keeps his muddled gaze on Malik to follow his morning routine on the water well. When Desmond offers response, it’s not the hesitant tone he expects, nor the words he is hoping for.

“There... there are men expressing interest towards marrying Malik. If you release him...” Desmond says after a false start.

Altaïr swirls to side to glare at him with a strange addition to his former expression of regret—a blaze of pure-faced anger and filthy snarl at the very proposition of divorce or, even worse, entrusting Malik into another man’s hands.

“You may as well have cut off the balls from my shaft,” he hisses from the floor and the flare of nostrils is the same one Desmond had provoked when they were climbing this hill upon return. How often he seems to provoke Altaïr’s anger when he doesn’t intend harm.

“Remove the thought. My heart doesn’t move towards letting him go,” Altaïr ends his words with a flutter of shame, as if he recognized the absurdity of hoping for anything while at the same time being unable to part from the one who is causing him grief. He slips onto the bench beside Desmond and pats him on shoulder, to relieve him of guilt and burden of his former outburst. He keeps his hand there less for comfort of Desmond and more for comfort to himself, and Desmond lifts his arm and slings it around Altaïr before it turns into rubbing across Altaïr’s icy back despite his own coldness, and he slowly warms him into something that might appear human.

“Perhaps you will find common grounds.” Desmond whispers to him with a whiff of wine upon breath and arm wound around his back and hand kneading into the muscle of Altaïr’s shoulder.

“Perhaps I’ll sprout wings and flutter off like [Gdila](http://the-king-of-novices.tumblr.com/post/104486350666/live-forever-or-die-trying-the-pantheon-2-10).”

Altaïr shrugs himself out of this embrace not to shake off the comfort it brings (comfort, physical comfort included, is as common an occurrence among soldiers as among all other men) but to deprive Malik of knowledge of how deep into despair he has descended.

The other half of offering to Hiba sits on table unattended until Malik’s return, until he seats himself on the bench across them as if to flaunt off to Altaïr that he won’t give him a share of what he is enjoying.

Altaïr has no time to wallow in this display as Malik’s return to table seems to have drawn two other figures—three, upon second examination.

Anne takes a seat with babe in arm and Mary remains on foot a moment longer, stands at Malik’s back smoothing down his black hair, then tugging at the rim of his ear lovingly, and Malik doesn’t need to look at Anne, nor at the perpetrator of this touch, to know who is guarding his back. Mary seats herself at last, with back turned to Altaïr, perhaps even to Desmond, with elbows set upon table behind her and ankle drawn up to her other knee. Her stance is wide, her territory vast, and her smirk equally conquering as she lifts her hand sluggishly into maneuvering it towards Malik’s face where she whisks a stubborn crumb away from the corner of his mouth as a caring mother would do to a child—an image in much disagreement with the austerity of her overall appearance. What the two warriors can’t see but Malik does is the frisky little twitch of her eyebrows which is in meaning far inferior to her flit of eyes towards Anne, but they do see the shadowy tug of Anne’s rosy lips upwards into a smile-or-smirk which is far superior to her wife’s expression, and both expressions combined put Malik’s face on a pedestal between them where he stands with a high-class confusion pulling at his face as he looks to and fro between them.

The warriors watch this elaborate caste system of facial expressions from across the table mindful of how Malik’s gaze drops suddenly to the last bite of Hiba’s offering and then goes on a strenuous climb towards Anne’s awaiting face as he realizes at last that the offering to Hiba was made by her. The secret remains but the loud truth of it is spoken through a silent exchange of looks.

“The kid needs a chaperon for a day,” Mary jumps straight to the point. Malik doesn’t blink an eye but leans in towards Anne to smooth down a chubby little cheek with the back of his index finger, an untamed smile on his face.

“When?”

“Tomorrow,” Anne tells him. She has one arm firmly settled around her child—a hold of a practiced, able-bodied woman who is an experienced multi-tasker—and the other on Malik’s jaw while he hovers over the sleeping bundle. She shifts between catching the supple skin of Malik’s cheek into a pinch and stroking across it while he showers rivaling affection upon their baby. Between the two women, Malik can pass as the second, grown child.

“Where do you intend?”

“We are sacrificing to Daga,” Mary clarifies, a piece of information that prompts Malik to right himself fast enough to catch the misty-eyed look that passes between the wives.

“But the first clean night is far off,” Malik happens to remember, but takes no pride in accidentally forgetting another possibility that springs to his mind far too late for him to be able to correct it. Mary is there to remind him.

“We’ve no alternative but to sacrifice privately then,” she says with a stretch of fresh smirk upon her lip and Malik doesn’t need to follow the path of her gaze while she looks past him to throw a flirty look to know it’s directed at Anne, “She will insist on this terrible sacrilege. Nothing is too holy to trample on when she’s desperate for her wife.”

Anne rises from the bench.

The movement is done in response to Mary’s tease, a lurching motion softened by the burden of the baby in her arm but no less imposing as she drifts past Malik’s back and towards Mary’s awaiting smirk, and when Anne swipes her free hand at her cheek to slap it from her smug face Mary shackles her wrist with an effortless catch and tugs her down until Anne guides herself straight into her lap.

The company around them has mixed feelings about their ensuing kiss.

While Malik’s amusement gives rise to a stifled chuckle that drives his entire frame into a spasmodic tremble, Desmond drops his gaze to the table to avoid inappropriate staring at the lure of their lip-lock, and Altaïr glares, as if Mary’s acts are worthy of blame for Malik’s refusal to slip into his lap in the same manner. One woman’s domestic fluidity can be another man’s domestic mess.

Anne’s hand is released in mid-kiss and she combs it through Mary’s hair—loose, ripe for tangling fingers in it or pulling, as Anne is doing while she keeps a collection of her beads in fist and doesn’t relent a sliver. And having regained reins of their kiss, Anne lifts herself with the slightest delay in removing her lips from Mary’s and recommences her interrupted motion of hand with such a surge in vigor and disregard of strength that her slap connects with Mary’s cheek in a smack fat enough to spill across the entire vacant courtyard and disperse with a lasting tinnitus. By the time Anne saunters away with a deliberate sway of hips and falls back into their home at an easy pace, Mary has recovered from the slap and set gaze to trailing after her with a riotous excitement across her face and reddened cheek pulled into a toothy smirk.

“That’s my girl,” Mary boasts with profound admiration and sets her teeth into a smiling lip with pride and anticipation mixed—an expression of someone who is most fervently looking forward to Daga’s sacrifice. Malik is not wont to break the bubble of her anticipation but curiosity wins the race.

“You’ve not been on duty last night?”

She turns to him, smile diminished, a sober expression on her face.

“Duty rotation is to blame,” she enlightens him rubbing over her stinging cheek to help the color drain from it, “Haven’t had it in years. These new foreigners are to blame. And those who offered invitation to them.”

The latter is an implicit sting at the duo that sits at the table behind her, one of whom is bothered by it enough to retaliate at the insult.

“If you have a point to argue you are free to do so. But to my face.” Altaïr’s tone is astringent and seeking trouble he hungers for to divert attention from heartbreak.

To Malik’s unfolding horror, Mary shifts to face his husband, setting boot after boot into proper place until she is leaning on elbow to complete this circle. Malik is mindful of her other hand on her hip. Mary has her sword strapped at her side. Altaïr is weaponless. His disadvantage is vast.

“And here is a warrior showing how much he actually gives a toss about what's going on.”

“What is?” Altaïr grits out.

“Foreigners.”

“And so? Foreigners have been ever present in the city.”

“These are not ordinary foreigners. Traders, artists, merchants. These are the scum that _you_ brought along—“

An eerie trot of hooves bursts from the tunnel, a sound muffled by the heavy drapery at its mouth, before a long-maned beast of a horse canters through tossing its charcoal mane into the folds of the curtain.

There is only a set of limbs to behold until the riding figure boosts itself upright after the mare exits the tunnel entirely, and this fuller image reveals a pair of familiar, ruddy lips in the shadows of a dark hood.

“Greetings,” Claudia hails.

He holds herself in strange poise, looks as if she drifted by to impart some grave knowledge, looks as if she’s traversed the city for many dark hours on end to gather what she knows. She takes a brief meander while they watch her expectantly, and her beast applies itself to browsing around the massive table. The burnished coat of the black mare glimmers under the light, appears as if the morning light that plays across her back is seeping into her dark color turning it into a gleam of ash, as if the darkness of her coat is receding by her mere presence in light.

Claudia is soused in enigmatic silence. While she canters around the table she is sitting up straight and proud, an imposing figure in her dark robes lifting the weight of her upper body from saddle and rocking her hips forward on par with the cadence of her beast’s trot. She rounds the table before she accosts Mary from the side, until the beast drives itself into Mary’s outstretched, awaiting hand. The mare nickers, shakes her head in greeting while Mary’s sure hand glides down her strong, velvety neck.

Claudia says nothing at first.

Her hand is peeking suddenly from the folds of her robe, a lily hand that seems to glow against the darkness of fabric it escaped from, and Mary takes it into a hefty grasp. She climbs the bench to use as boost and swings her leg over the mare’s rump settling behind Claudia in little more than a moment.

The mare seems to invite herself into the next caress as soon as Malik makes a move. He extends his arm to put the hand in the beasts path and she leaps warmly into this call and sets herself under his palm and glides through until his hand is flush against her dusky neck.

“Altaïr,” Claudia beckons, and Altaïr looks up from Malik’s petting the beast, “Al Mualim sends for you. One of you is to divine the location of your mission from his second-in-command and to ask for further instruction.”

Altaïr watches her until his expression amounts to something that appears like confusion, but he makes no attempt to require the source of her findings. He is picking his lessons up with swiftness. One of them is to not pry into Claudia’s resources of information. He nods in recognition and she doesn’t expect more from him and tightens her reigns, nudges her mare into a gallop.

The two figures duck as they scud through the tunnel and fall from sight.

“I’ll go,” Desmond breaks the silence.

Malik is making to leave the table but he halts long enough to listen to the end of this exchange. Desmond’s proposition is not without personal motive. He volunteers because Al Mualim’s second-in-command is Lucy. Desmond's face is brimming with unkempt enthusiasm he strains to correct and he allows a frown onto his face in a puny attempt to hide the zeal no one at the table chides him for.

The wonder lies not within Altaïr’s easy acquiescence to this as he gives Desmond a nod in consent. The wonder lies in the sobering speed of Desmond’s preparations to leave. He collects what he deems his from around the table and then mops up his courage.

Malik feels a stab of pity when Desmond scampers off to see the woman he has placed far above himself.

 

* * *

 

The momentous truth of Desmond’s journey is that it’s spent in a state of disorder.

He ebbs and flows between an unsteady confidence and unwavering doubt, but this inner quarrel is a necessary part of this process, for the pace in which he walks towards meeting Lucy can only be kept up if he doesn’t give in to complete hesitation. He walks then marches a steady path passing [Ya’ar](http://the-king-of-novices.tumblr.com/post/114871631011/live-forever-or-die-trying-the-pantheon-6-10)’s academy, moving past Barzel’s market to the left, and down into the lower half of the inner city.

He knows where Lucy resides.

They way to her quarters seems simple in theory, from what Claudia has imparted upon him. The more he prods at the possibility of having a closer glimpse of this woman, the deeper he settles into the lull of confidence that carries him towards the fortification. When Desmond is close enough that the walled structure can be viewed from afar with bare eye, an odd display arrests his attention.

At the corner of the street is drowsy artist huddled against a wall and crouching with her sketchpad on knees while she sweeps across the paper furiously, with pieces of charcoal around her. Desmond can tell artists apart from other citizens after a mere glimpse. They are unpredictable, often invisible. They steal out at night to capture stray nightly figures or wait for [Masekha ](http://the-king-of-novices.tumblr.com/post/106253964456/live-forever-or-die-trying-the-pantheon-5-10)to show herself, they meander among the crowds and between streets on lookout for curious scenes or people who capture their attention. At days of their own choice, they present whatever they've captured on the forum, and there is where people can find themselves among the paintings and sketches, if they've been or have done something to capture enough interest.

When Desmond was still a boy learning the art of sword, an artist captured a moment of his training. He found it among the collection of other scenes during one market day when he didn't have enough money to buy his likeness. The picture is still preserved in his home. Altaïr had offered his share of money to cover the cost of that exciting find. Two orphans joining resources to buy what they separately could never afford.

Desmond wonders what the artist is capturing. Curiosity subdues him until he gives in and peers down the street to share a view.

At the intersection of two neighboring streets, a posse of warriors is having an exchange with a handful of foreign soldiers.

This display is no stranger to Desmond—unwelcome but not unfamiliar—and he takes pause in mid-journey for the sake of information the night guard from Altaïr’s community passed onto them earlier. The words are fresh and linger still. Mary’s words have been like a door half-opened. Desmond knows foreigners have always been a floating population, but he puts his hand upon the door that has been opened and waits to measure whether Mary’s warning is worth of pushing it open, or ripe for closing.

The warriors number almost ten to three of foreign soldiers.

Desmond is not wont to admit, but it is _his_ comrades who look like a collection of drunken bullies on prowl for fights, and not the other way around. Idleness has driven them to aimless paths around the city.

“You cower like weaklings hiding behind steel!” A warrior bellows with a filthy tone and spirited pointing at foreign armors, and Desmond listens to her and feels as if it was only yesterday that he spouted same insults on foreign soil.

He knows this ancient debate. It is cheap but demands defense in the face of treatment foreigners had bestowed upon their women warriors and their customs once, while they were far away from homes. Here, on native soil, warriors are enticed by the mere whiff of foreign soldiers, scavenging for small clusters of them to poke for fun, unaware that the warriors as such no longer exist. Desmond would be guilty of hypocrisy if he condemned his comrades for ignorance. The news of disbandment has not yet spread far and he knows it only through association with Altaïr.

The accused soldier sneers in response to the insult, his hands shake with inaction. The posse of warriors barks with laughter at their hesitation, their dithering. Desmond used to unleash his slurs in plain mockery of their full-body armor. Foreigners rely on steal to protect their ranks. Helmets, breastplates, grieves, gauntlets, vambraces—a body encased in heavy steel. Warrior armor, in stark contrast, consisted of the eagle helmet, a pair of boots, a button-shaped shield, a sword, loincloth beneath the skirt of leathery feathers, and one spauldron for the sword hand—modified to protect chest when worn by female warriors. Foreign infantry has for years been the figure of fun, their heavy armors impeding agility and speed have been mocked, their subsequent reliance on body protection has been ridiculed. Most of all, they were taunted for their lacking sense of community and comradeship. In warfare, coordination and cohesion in the lines are absolutely critical—they all fight together, or they all die together. And Desmond’s imagination doesn’t extend as far as to imagine dying at the side of one of these steal-encased foreigners. Entering into a fight with a single squadron of bonded warriors is like entering into a lost war.

Desmond lingers. Something is about to happen and he wishes to be there to see it, but he takes some pride in watching the warrior parade before the foreigners in her armor, a full circle she saunters before the insulted soldier gives voice to response between the jeers thrown their way:

“Better a coward than a woman!”

A skirmish ensues among the combatants.

Desmond seethes but the insult inflicted is not received as noiselessly by the woman who draws her sword and launches at the soldier in a burst of ferocity and though Desmond is aware of the righteousness of his other comrades who pull her back in time to spare the pavement the gore of bloody entrails, he wishes they would unleash her on the soldiers instead of putting effort into subduing her violence.

The foreign soldier is lucky he is still breathing.

None compare to the ferocity of their women warriors. The original children of [Nokem](http://the-king-of-novices.tumblr.com/post/104486337526/live-forever-or-die-trying-the-pantheon-1-10). The nobles.

This thought propels him on and he recommences walking, until he finds himself before a portion of wall reaching far in height from a side where the fort clean of any guards. Desmond is acquainted with the basic layout of this fortification but his intention doesn’t wander near the gates. He follows the climb upward of the bare wall and finds not even a hint of a crack suitable for scaling the sheer mass of this obstacle. The walls are thick and undressed, ungrateful for mounting, marked apart from their more recent addition in height (the new portion of extended wall that was constructed while they were away at war) with a simple, shallow groove in brick that indicates the height of the original wall.

The groove, and a smallish iron protrusion far above on wall (an inscrutable rod peeking from a single point in wall and creating some confusion as to its origin and presence), and nothing else to upset the complete smoothness of the surface.

There is not one window, or panel, or ornamental addition, that he can use as leverage to scale the wall.

Desmond had planned to sneak into the fort unnoticed. He endures this blunder to his schemes, stands still, skims across the wall once more, and the train of his thoughts goes swimmingly without a single obstacle to halt it.

Desmond begins to strip.

 

* * *

 

Al Mualim moves the pawn with Sibrand’s name square forward until it entirely covers the image of the port on map.

Lucy frowns.

“Sibrand to control the port?” She asks with mild distaste and leans across the table to bar Robert from hearing her concerns, “I have thought that is a dignified position, Rashid. For someone more worthy of it.”

Robert doesn’t hear her from half across the room nor does he make an attempt to do so, but she is attentive to the monotone drone of Robert’s voice. She listens to his dry account of mission planning and awaits judgment from the man who sits across stroking over his silvery beard while his eye flits across the map and pawns strewn about.

“Grain supply is allotted to Abu’l Nuqoud,” Al Mualim ponders.

A decision Lucy presently regrets, one born out of necessity for moving Robert closer towards the position of guarding the port.

“Sibrand already has tied himself to the business of mines,” Lucy presses on.

“The mines are a shared venture.”

“The money?”

“Split among several people to ease suspicion,” Al Mualim rights himself to take the pawn with Garnier’s inscription and place it above Hiba’s hospital. Lucy offers no protest but her worry stretches to decisions already discussed, and those that were not.

“You heard what the simple citizen thinks of our supremacy over the city. Malik’s words were an act of outrage coldly calculated.“

“We don’t know whether it was coldly calculated, but it was certainly an outrage,“ Lucy remembers this particular episode from the dinner.

“Whatever the case, our authority must be secure.“

Lucy absorbs the point and to argue is pointless. Malik’s outburst was as inconvenient as it was convenient and it gave justification to Al Mualim to act on original intentions and shush dissent voices earlier dismissed by her and others.

“You tear at a serpent when it may yet bite,” Lucy repeats an old lesson as warning.

“Altaïr will see him properly tamed.”

Al Mualim seems convinced. Lucy is less persuaded into the possibility of that but her mind wanders to other paths.

“Altaïr’s comrades?” She asks dully, careful to keep interest off one of the warriors.

“Easily dismissed.”

Lucy looks up from the pawn in hand (it's Talal’s, still unsorted) and regards him quietly for but a few moments, and she needs not even speak for AL Mualim to be swayed into her reasoning, whatever it may be that she deems useful. Lucy’s memory is wonderful. Her allegiance to his cause, too, is of crucial importance.

“You often disparage such men until they are needed next time,” Lucy says, covertly claiming her slice of cake, “I may yet have use for them.”

Al Mualim’s consent is immediate. He is quick to seize the notion that these men are worth keeping an eye on.

“I won’t stand between you and gossip.”

Her satisfaction she presents in form of silence. And stillness. She doesn’t attempt to remove Sibrand’s pawn from the port, and somewhere in the vast room they presently occupy, she can hear Sibrand’s voice as well among a dozen others. Her consent is not born of a fond heart.

Lucy couldn’t learn to trust all these foreigners who have swarmed the city even if she had all nine months of a year at her disposal. She harbors aversion towards this whole lot, not because they are non-natives, but because they are making it a point of honor to insult the communities and all she stands for, the exception being Robert who restrains himself is such regard, for which she deems him honorable enough.

The business of chopping this city up into pieces like cabbage is a veritable gold mine. From export of precious stones to import of even more precious wood. A staggering amount of gold and income is involved in gathering the city under one grasp. An appropriation made possible by clutch of two hands combined, with the power of this grasp distributed into all ten fingers. Lucy takes issue with how these fingers are assigned but protest is futile. It was these men that once helped purge the city of traitors and aided in war fought on their own soil. And though Al Mualim’s gifts for these favors may be far too generous, Lucy knows that these people have been too deeply involved to be dislodged from their city now.

The decisions are born of a heavy heart but clear mind.

Of all times, it seems as if Al Mualim is seizing this opportunity to delve into Lucy’s obvious concerns. He always did seem to believe that their stratagem of dividing the city is perfectly rational.

“Who else once wisely divided up power into pieces?”

Lucy’s frown stands even as her mind jumps to the first of two notables who embarked upon such hazard of power division.

“Nokem?”

When Al Mualim retains his straight face, she tries anew, “Ga’ash?”

Al Mualim gives a solemn nod. It impels her towards considering the lessons of their creation myth.

Ga’ash once was intimidated by [Nokem](http://the-king-of-novices.tumblr.com/post/104486337526/live-forever-or-die-trying-the-pantheon-1-10) after he made himself the god of vengeance. Ga’ash once did recognize that his own ferocity paled against Nokem’s wrath, that he entangled himself with a more powerful opponent, that in order to defeat Nokem he must find alliances elsewhere. And having understood that a clash would not be to his advantage, Ga’ash split himself into nine parts, nine dark spirits that scattered across the island to hide and slow down Nokem’s quest for revenge.

Al Mualim’s imagery is clear.

They are splitting power into nine parts, these evil spirits, as Ga’ash once split himself into pieces. Lucy’s duty is no different to that of Sheker. As was instructed by Ga’ash, the goddess sent her icy winds to raze all flora to ground to leave [Ya’ar](http://the-king-of-novices.tumblr.com/post/114871631011/live-forever-or-die-trying-the-pantheon-6-10) mute, so that the god of forest would not disclose the hiding places of Ga’ash’s spirits. One of Lucy’s duties is to render dissent voices mute.

“Neither of gods was bound to be successful by mere splitting of power,” Lucy remarks with satisfaction which is manifold and heartfelt. Al Mualim doesn’t concur with her words, nor is he at odds with this truth. Powerful as Al Mualim might be, powerful as he will get, he is nothing without Lucy. Ga’ash could not find alliance on his own absent her aid, nor could Nokem kill Ga’ash’s evil spirits on his own.

Lucy is a descendant of Nokem’s first children and she can’t but hold some pride in this noble origin. They were the first human warriors to roam this island.

First humans crafted by Nokem to aid justice, fierce warriors to help him track down all nine parts of Ga’ash. The second wave of humans, though equal in body, stems from the love seed of [Nokem](http://the-king-of-novices.tumblr.com/post/104486337526/live-forever-or-die-trying-the-pantheon-1-10) and [Gdila](http://the-king-of-novices.tumblr.com/post/104486350666/live-forever-or-die-trying-the-pantheon-2-10). Between love and justice, the latter took precedence in the minds of their ancestors. Perhaps because they were made by Nokem, whose thirst for justice was vast. Ga’ash himself recognized how valuable humans are, how powerful Nokem was for having them, but he could not make them—few gods could—but he could split his power.

“And so we split the city to aid justice...” Lucy trails off, imbued deep in distant pondering.

“And then order is restored, if not human happiness,” Al Mualim tags on.

“I’ll make arrangement for the mission,” she says without dwelling on the sore spot that is this self-proclaimed ‘mission’. If hurt is too deep, better it is to keep it as far away from thoughts as possible.

There is jokes and laughter where the lot of foreigners idles away across the room, except for Robert who is immersed in his plans at a shorter distance. Lucy pins her gaze to one image that is of most interest and most annoyance to her. Abu’l, that extraordinarily disagreeable man, lounges keeping one of the young pages seated on his lap. Lucy seldom looks at this overfed lout Al Mualim tolerates only because of his expertise in grain trade, except when he keeps harassing pages, and that is when Lucy unleashes all that is stored in her mind.

The page, a boy of youth and beauty, doesn’t seem much too burdened by Abu’l’s attentions but Lucy doesn’t want to restrain herself through silence while she holds power far above them all, not when the instinct to protect the community is stronger than her.

“Abu’l!” Lucy calls out unfailingly, a succinct warning to this insufferable brute who is attractive to pages only as far as his generosity in gifts goes. The page lolled in Abu’l’s large lap reads the warning before the man himself does and he slips off his lap to slink away from the reach of Lucy’s disapproval, but Abu’l grasps the boy’s wrist to lock him in place.

“You will lull your guests to slumber,” he calls across the distance between, with a servile smile to contrast with Lucy’s incensed face.

“Then spirit yourself away,” she sneers, she is making to rise, but Robert inserts himself into the picture before it can erupt into a quarrel, or worse, a conflict of interests damaging to the entire circle.

“Do as she says,” Robert orders to conform to her demands. The page does so without a second glance, Abul’l is less keen to follow example but he claws himself up from his comfortable seat and departs with exaggerated gestures of obeisance.

“Gratitude,” Lucy says discreetly, without wasting a moment of time.

“A pleasure as always,” Robert monotones without sugarcoating and then returns to his scheming. Lucy collects herself and departs to her own quarters of the fortress.

 

* * *

 

The long hall leading into Lucy’s quarters is one-half open to the skies with an outlook into the inner court of the fort, one-half roofed.

Beneath the roofed half, in front of the sealed double doors, loiters a figure reclined on wall, arms crossed. Her thoughts set off into a short, quick race and the light of her astonishment fades gently. He shouldn’t be here. The guards would have dropped note upon letting him through. The walls would have barred entry to intruders. Yet he is here.

She idles a moment away and sets out towards him.

Desmond unfurls from the wall and they meet halfway.

“I come in response to invitation,” the warrior says. His armor doesn’t lack a single strand of eagle tail, he is in full regalia. Lucy takes in his form this proximity, this new angle, and scales up towards his inclined head, skims quickly over the mask clinging to his smart face.

“I didn’t call you,” Lucy retorts.

She keeps her eyes firmly set on his lips not eyes. The impetus that pulls his lips up into a looped smile gives her all warning she needs and Lucy is far from stunned when he pulls at her wrists, coils thumb and index finger around them spreading the rest of fingers across the back of her hands to maneuver them into a clutch as he unapologetically puts them down onto his ass tugging her closer in the process.

“This did.”

Her hands feel like icicles on his skin.

“You mistake touch for the wrong intent,” she whispers through a smirk that annuls her words entirely, with a husk of voice that shakes Desmond to the core and settles near his crotch to reside there while she's wont to give it life. She imposes herself on him then, abruptly, she flicks the leather feathers of his skirt aside-and-away and grabs without relent, bucks him into the wall, renews her clutch to dig into the muscle of his ass until she sates herself through means of touch.

Desmond is in the midst of conjuring a clear head when she leans in with breath washing over his chin and parted lips—they are of same height, he grasps in a barely borrowed instant—and the eager roughness of her thrust into the wall even at the cost of strain on her hands can’t be washed off with the meek smile on her face.

“I must assess further to give proper response,” she husks again and her hands tighten immodestly. Desmond tips his head in to put her filthy insinuation to an untimely end. She evades his attempt in the blink of an eye as if she expected him to lean in for a kiss, but she doesn’t shut off and the smile remains.

“Desmond,” she quips in mock surprise.

She jests but she doesn’t allow him that close and he is content with what he has managed thus far. Despite this setback, Desmond allows her to feel him up at her leisure and merely coils his arms around her waist as exchange for freedom offered.

She knows his name. It gives him joy to know she fostered enough interest to find his name out.

Her fingers rove over his muscles and he settles into her groping with ease and smiles in response to her inventiveness in touch. He rests assured that the attraction _was_ and is mutual, after all. Efforts have paid off. He has a penchant for women like Lucy and his fancy goes beyond the realm of only liking.

She leans in again and they settle against the wall, and though Desmond is in same trouble as before he’s not taken over by desire to close the gap. He leaves the reigns in her hand and waits for a tug.

“Time is pressed, let’s turn to business.” She rids herself of the throaty voice but her body speaks in unchanged tone and Desmond follows its undulations while she still drinks herself senseless on the sight of his lips.

“To the matter then,” he reminds.

“I’ve a mission for you, Miles.”

“I’ve gathered as much.”

Her left hand closes into a pinch and he smirks at this swap of innocuous jabs and how well she is accepting it. She smooths down the injured spot and tightens her hands on his rear anew, and it's a broad and hungry grip as if she annexed his body for the duration of this exchange, and Desmond lets her have her pleasure. His own touch pales in comparison to hers but he is content to stroke up-and-down the small of her back and wait for her lead.

“You are to assemble at [Gdila](http://the-king-of-novices.tumblr.com/post/104486350666/live-forever-or-die-trying-the-pantheon-2-10)’s fountain when the moon is at the zenith. All further instruction shall be received there and then,” she explains succinctly. He commits the instruction to memory, then nods. This motion alone brings him closer to her lips for the briefest moment but he doesn’t venture further.

“Don’t fail me, Desmond.”

Desmond feels that the tacking on of his name is deliberate. It draws attention as much as the smooth and noiseless transition of expressions across her features that slowly shift into uneasiness.

“Your associate, the strict, orderly one—“

“Friend,” he corrects her promptly.

“Your friend, Altaïr,” she stresses on second try, “can he be trusted?”

Desmond frowns and looks at her oddly.

“Do you think me a fool?”

Lucy's grip falls lax for a moment.

“There are many words I would have used towards your description, but fool is not amongst them.” Her masquerade is drawing to a close. For Desmond, it’s the second miracle in less than an hour of time. The first has been having his ancestry ignored by a noble. The second, equally grave, is that Lucy seems to be giving his words weight and his opinion validation.

“You evade?” Lucy asks.

He doesn’t evade. He is never in proper position to have his opinion evaluated with deserved seriousness and that is a completely different set of problems. Lucy doesn’t seem to be pleased with this revelation, and she is frighteningly quick to catch on.

“I’m unused to people listening to my opinion,” Desmond responds and rushes to add word before she can dwell on this, “I trust Altaïr with my life.”

She smiles wistfully.

“How noble, to have such trust between friends.” She paints an elaborate picture of expressions across her face. The art of it is not cleanliness she doesn’t have on her expression, it’s the open revolt for his trusting someone whom she deems unworthy. Desmond is less sure if she’s displeased at this for involving herself personally, or for the simple association to him as someone she couldn't attach strings on and maneuver around.

“One must choose his company with exceeding care,“ Desmond says.

The wall is cold against his bare back and he shifts his position, unafraid of the possibility that he might have disturbed their join of bodies through this. She doesn’t strive to untangle herself from him and he follows the thin trail of a genuine smile on her face. She wants to remain there. For whatever reason, she wants. The confidential smile dips into the hollow of her expression and even though it’s lost, Desmond finds the ease in their exchange to be the best link imaginable. Lucy is assigning to him more attention than he expected she would. He had known very little of her only a few hours ago, but now he is learning something every instant.

“I need your favor,” she scrubs her words off embellishment but expects consent.

“I like getting my teeth into a nice juicy problem,” Desmond drawls and draws his hands down the small of her back anew, holds her as if they’ve been in this position for years on end, with Lucy’s grabby hands tight on his ass and his arms gentle around her waist while they plot, and he is consciously living in this little play of theirs.

“You are closer to the city. You walk among the people. Keep your eyes and ears open for me.”

Desmond _is_ closer to the city. He lives among the citizens while Lucy’s myopic gaze is limited by the walls of her fortification. He is half-mind to consent at once when she suddenly attempts to drown him in some warm flow of a simpler, a more corrupt notion.

“I won’t let your efforts be unrewarded.”

Desmond recognizes this whole affair to be a bargain. He chuckles.

“You speak sweetly. But you’ve the tongue of Sheker,” he says firmly, bereft humor, bereft scorn. He is not angry but dampened by her needing to resort to means of bribery to gain his favor. He needs neither money nor sexual indulgence as payment for loyalty. Desmond has her in his arms and feels the difference in her stance, the widening of gap between them as she leans away to look over his face.

“Sheker managed to sway [Gdila](http://the-king-of-novices.tumblr.com/post/104486350666/live-forever-or-die-trying-the-pantheon-2-10).”

“While he was yet a fool.”

Lucy grows colder. She releases him—from duty, from ties, from her presence—and withdraws from his loose hold. His gaze follows after when she breezes past him to retreat into her chambers.

At Al Mualim’s gathering, their courtship (if it can be named so at any rate) had been a pavane, a stately unfolding, bound by rules never agreed upon or voiced but generally observed, and subsequently crowned with Lucy blatant grope. But here, in the silence of their secluded conversation, Lucy had no reason to polish her act into anything more than a maskless exchange of touch and word unburdened by ulterior motives. And yet she attempted to.

It’s during that miniscule gap between unsolicited annoyance and thinking back to the start of their conversation that Lucy remembers what she just turned her back to.

She swirls around but Desmond is not there.

She rushes towards the unroofed portion of the passage and surveys the fort courtyard frantically, searches for the armored figure along the winding of wall, but she is met with no result but utter confusion instead.

Desmond has vanished from sight. Lucy doesn't know how he got in.

 

* * *

 

Altaïr finds his husband seated inside home and immersed in work.

Malik spares him a glance which can be called ‘sparing’ when exaggerated and looks more like charity. He appears to be stitching something, until Altaïr gives it a second glance and finds no piece of cloth but a thread, needle, and silver framework in the shape of a fish.

Altaïr feels unwelcome but he sacks his hesitance and takes a seat across his husband taking care to look at least half as busy as Malik. He takes to polishing the handle then the blade of his sword, until he runs out of steel to furbish. The moment is precarious—as is any in his husband’s presence—and he lays his sword out across the side of table Malik doesn’t have use for and waits for his finicky bravado to allow him speech.

“You make death catchers?” Altaïr asks at last.

Malik parts his gaze from the death catcher to consider Altaïr’s face and chooses to participate. Altaïr doesn’t require confirmation. He has already led a furtive glance on expedition towards Malik’s little tally that's spread on table, in which an order of death catchers is jotted down as commissioned business.

“As often as maps. Which is not very often,” Malik says lacking regret since any wish for more death catchers would be craving for more death, and Malik’s need for money isn’t greedy enough to wish death upon people for better earning.

Altaïr now knows what his husband’s scarlet stone represents on the city marble map. Malik creates death catchers. Altaïr was tasked by obligation once to create a makeshift death catcher on his own, for a fallen comrade in the aftermaths of a battle, but it couldn’t compare in beauty with Malik’s organized, deliberate work. A scarlet stone for a maker of death catchers.

A scarlet stone which stands for the scarlet color of the thread. The thread Malik pulls through the dots in the fish framework is the length of someone’s body—of someone who passed away recently.

“Was it someone from our community?”

“No,” Malik appends the word to a brief shake of head. He is not glib today, not inclined to excessive talking.

Between them—between that void sitting on table from Altaïr to the coil of the scarlet thread meandering across Malik’s half of it—sits a thick bowl teeming with sweet little treats Altaïr is deliberately disregarding. It is the kind of treat he had meager chance to indulge in during his seven years of soldiering and the beckoning scent of buttery dough glazed with honey is muddling with whatever is keeping him from having a taste. He keeps the bowl untouched as a border between them.

“Why are our graveyards named ‘fish graveyards’?”

Malik’s gaze swerves from his work to look up at his husband but he stores his amazement at this plain, unadorned question and regards Altaïr with something that can’t divulge to Altaïr whether Malik evaluates him as some clueless foreigner or as someone who is seeking to ensnare a person into conversation by means of simple tricks. Malik decides to participate in this cross-examination as a way to dodge boredom.

“We didn’t always have graveyards,” Malik sets off, having made the decision to launch a proper start into this little trickery.

Altaïr knows this. Knows every little corner of this playground, but hearing it from Malik’s mouth makes the game more thrilling. He is acquainted with this side-addition to their myth as he is with all others and he knows that between the two only waves of humans—one caused by Nokem alone and the second a product of love between Nokem and [Gdila](http://the-king-of-novices.tumblr.com/post/104486350666/live-forever-or-die-trying-the-pantheon-2-10)—Nokem tasked the god of death to guide his humans through it. And [Zikaron](http://the-king-of-novices.tumblr.com/post/119950551366/god-zikaron-patron-of-death-prophecies), the god of death, did request to have the deceased for himself and Nokem did allow Zikaron to have his humans in death.

“Nokem’s children were not many. Upon death, they could be interred beneath their homes, or have ashes buried beneath doorstep, for they were less in numbers,” Malik comes to a standstill. Inside the metal fish-frame, he is involved in an intricate thread pattern whose inner workings Altaïr couldn't unravel with ease. The pause Malik takes unnerves Altaïr, he doesn’t want to give him room for silence.

“Why?” Altaïr jolts him from whatever ponder he is wasting himself on.

Malik turns eye towards him, to measure Altaïr’s aim from his expression, and finds him hungry for words, however unrelated to their marriage. Malik knows what Altaïr asks and he maintains the game, goes on to give him the answer he already knows but craves to hear whispered from husband’s lips.

“They buried their loved ones beneath houses to keep their spirits nearby. That they could watch over the living and protect them,” he reminds, mulls over the possibility of stopping this odd exchange, but Altaïr is rapt with attention for his words and his expression is the greatest thief of all, it steals from Malik’s silence.

“With the second wave of people in the city, maintaining this practice was but wishful thinking. Graveyards were needed. And [Zikaron](http://the-king-of-novices.tumblr.com/post/119950551366/god-zikaron-patron-of-death-prophecies) did give humans scarlet threads, to measure the length of a body’s person after they pass away, to... to preserve the life thread in...” In this awkward swapping between silence and intermittent words, Malik simply lifts the death catcher to indicate wordlessly where the thread is preserved. To indicate that the scarlet life thread Malik holds in hand was used to measure the length of someone’s body.

“And people then buried their dead at graveyards?” Altaïr prompts, awaits another ration of words. Malik’s huff of a chuckle takes him by surprise.

“No,” Malik answers, “No one dared the first step. It was believed that whoever buries the first body on a graveyard will invite a curse on their family which will remain cursed until all die out. The family that would defy risk could not be found. And the god of death was getting restless. He could not guide the dead into afterlife lacking proper burial.”

“And what happened then?”

Altaïr has caught notice of something darker on Malik’s face before it could take solid form—it is the thought, perhaps, that his own family was not guided into afterlife, as Malik had not a single scarlet thread to make a death catcher for his own loved ones—and to pull Malik from darker thoughts was his aim in asking the question. Malik seizes this distraction.

“[Daga](http://the-king-of-novices.tumblr.com/post/105887755561/live-forever-or-die-trying-the-pantheon-4-10) saw all this. To [Zikaron](http://the-king-of-novices.tumblr.com/post/119950551366/god-zikaron-patron-of-death-prophecies) she offered one of her fish for the first burial. A fish was buried in the first grave instead of a human, and since then our graveyards are called fish graveyards,” Malik answers his husband's wayward question at last.

“And so Zikaron and [Daga](http://the-king-of-novices.tumblr.com/post/105887755561/live-forever-or-die-trying-the-pantheon-4-10) forged a close friendship,” the warrior concludes with a wistful smile while he fiddles around a portion of the bowl rim, as if his fingers refuse to part from the rim until this odd touch amounts to a silent plea for permission to taste the sweets.

“And no humans were pressed into making the first step. So Zikaron could see the dead off into peace and give humans means to preserve their ancestors’ spirits and keep them close through death catchers.”

There are but a few stitches to pull before the death catcher is finished.

Malik’s dark eyes land on Altaïr’s devious hand and show no contempt for his tacit quest for approval. All Altaïr’s discipline depended on Malik’s consent, and now that the obstacle is removed, he nicks one of the small flat cakes from top and fits it inside his mouth. Malik turns attentions to his work giving him free reign over the bowl. He thinks nothing of it. If Altaïr’s warrior palate is near anything Desmond had warned of, then the seven years in camps have trained his husband’s palate to defy spices and excessive sweetness. He doesn’t expect him to eat more than one cake—two, if his mangled tastes are generous enough to allow him eating another one.

While Altaïr was toiling away in the war, he and his closest comrades were invariably given the biggest and best morsels from those intended for warriors. Among themselves, the warriors always complained: the soup was too salty, the porridge too bland, peas were served too often. It was in the soldier encampments that Altaïr grasped the importance of meals and understood that real food is prepared over the low but steady fire of love.

Marching unit by unit into vast, gusty tents to present their tacky bowls in attempts to solicit bigger portions from the pitiless cooks was not enjoying meal, but consuming necessity. Their meals were fantastically limited affairs. A piece of dried bread, a boiled egg if you had a stroke of luck, a cube of rancid butter, and occasionally a slice of gooey, unsmoked bacon. This breakfast they washed down with tepid water from cups that had been absorbing grease for all eternity. Their dinner—if they were lucky enough to have one—entailed a filling thick bean soup, complete with tiny sprouts that looked exactly like maggots, or cold tuna, or indefinable concoctions of gruel to slurp on in addition to impenetrable dried fruit. Meals that rarely had time for conversation, as they were meant to be devoured quickly before the warriors made their way into the next ravenous battle. As a child in [Hiba](http://the-king-of-novices.tumblr.com/post/105028879746/live-forever-or-die-trying-the-pantheon-3-10)’s orphanage, Altaïr was never left hungry. As a warrior in his tent, Altaïr often recalled those dinners and spent his moments of elusive peace constructing elaborate meals featuring warm bread and honeyed sweets prepared by his meek, loving husband.

Altaïr has no meek or loving husband.

But the first bite of Malik’s cake—that sublime blend of richly-textured dough and glazed honey and creamy custard inside the core—brings tears to Altaïr’s eyes.

The trouble of this is not the tears he keeps at bay, but the hasty swallowing of a bite he meant to relish, done that he could clear his throat to put a curtain over his traitorous sniff. Malik doesn’t raise his gaze even when Altaïr tugs the bowl to himself with a subtle scrape across wood, and there’s not a scintilla of regret in Altaïr as he appropriates the sweets, but he is thick with gratitude while he wolfs the small balls of cake in a recursive loop of bites.

Malik is staring bluntly with a look of perplexity loafing about openly across his face by the time Altaïr is deep into the midst of the bowl. The bowl's baggage shrinks until there are only crumbs left in the wake of Altaïr’s voracious appetite. His husband is a sweet tooth. Malik jots this find down inwardly, for future reference.

The unassailable truth is that his bowl of sweets has just been sacked to the last crumb. The unanticipated truth is that Malik is facing failure while hunting for a reason to be lured into anger. Faced with the barren state of his bowl and the contented expression on Altaïr’s face, Malik takes genuine pride in his work, pointless and vain though it was.

Malik had spent his entire break between jobs making these sweets—a bowl brimming with Nokem’s and Hiba’s eyes, as they are endearingly called. They are dome-shaped cake bites with a dimple on top, filled with custard, frosted with honey syrup, dusted with nutmeg, and its dimple garnished with an almond—the peeled, lighter almond as [Hiba](http://the-king-of-novices.tumblr.com/post/105028879746/live-forever-or-die-trying-the-pantheon-3-10)’s golden eye and the one with preserved skin, the darker one, meant for [Nokem](http://the-king-of-novices.tumblr.com/post/104486337526/live-forever-or-die-trying-the-pantheon-1-10)’s eye. Malik has managed to eat but one Nokem’s eye, in passing.

Instead of finding his cakes vanished, Malik has expected them to be victim to a cascade of criticism. He has been patiently waiting for Altaïr to pelt him with disapproval, primed himself for letting it go on him like water on a duck’s back.

Instead, his husband’s sweetened lips part with a smack but words of gratitude remain lodged in his mouth. The gratitude for this unexpected, welcome treat is plain on Altaïr’s face, but because he suddenly withdraws voiced appreciation his thankfulness should be deemed a failure.

If that is a failure, seldom in the history of their relationship can Altaïr be said to have failed so successfully.

Altaïr’s appreciation of his food brings to light the dimmest shadow of pride on Malik’s features and he hides it, drops his face to immerse himself into wrapping up the commissioned death catcher. When there is no more work to hide behind, Malik still declines to have a glimpse. Keeping his face behind an invisible shield is more familiar than the complete foreignness of Altaïr forging a cozy warmth within his chest.

The sword on the table shifts and Malik jolts up into following its length to find Altaïr’s hand on the handle as he nudges the weapon closer to Malik.

“I entrust the sword into your care in my absence.”

Malik makes an ambiguous noise.

It’s a good sword. Equaling the worth of his own hidden one, the one screaming with want for blood of enemies. Malik stares at the gleam of the long blade for a few moments, by which time the mass of his admiration has accumulated, and he unwittingly lifts his hand to glide down the winding path of the groove channeled ornately into the surface of the sword.

Across the table, he hears Altaïr’s nasal chuckle.

“You are not familiar with what happens if anyone but the owner touches the warrior sword?”

Malik looks up at him, at last, to try to decipher the husky addition to Altaïr’s tone, and finds a dusting of color on the cupola of his bunched, smiling cheek. Malik furrows his brow—a result of thick frowning—but finds no knowledge stored in his mind to apply to present situation and waits for Altaïr to enlighten him.

“If anyone lays touch upon a warrior’s sword, the warrior is obliged by honor to kill them. Or kiss them.”

Malik plucks his hand from the blade with widened gaze.

He knows his answer will be due before long. He takes some pride in keeping up a fairly calm appearance, but the inside of his head wouldn’t astonish anyone in its current rush of disorder and frantic haste for appropriate answers.

“Ezio touched it once,” Altaïr conjures memory.

Ezio is alive, which points to the only other acceptable outcome. That Altaïr kissed the noble sets Malik in an impossible dilemma of choosing between measured anger and a more uncultivated anger, and makes him regard Ezio with deeper hatred. Malik harbors no wish to kiss Altaïr. Yet Altaïr is no one else’s to kiss, for the oath of fidelity they mutually promised. It matters not how it happened. It matters not that Altaïr tossed his own sword just in time to save Ezio’s life or spare him a grievous wound in battle, it matters less that Ezio found himself bereft blade in the heat of battle, it doesn’t matter at all that a brotherly kiss was the price of a saved life.

“It didn’t go beyond a peck,” Altaïr adds as assurance or as a way to pique Malik into response.

“I don’t care,” Malik grits out between a clench of teeth.

He cares.

It’s enough to escort Altaïr out of home with a smile upon kiss-deprived lip.

 

* * *

 

Desmond and Altaïr sit on the rim of the fountain joined at thighs and guard Ezio.

Ezio stands upright two steps ahead of them with arms stretched out above his head and hands attempting to arrest [Daga](http://the-king-of-novices.tumblr.com/post/105887755561/live-forever-or-die-trying-the-pantheon-4-10)’s tears from the heavens. His fingers toy over the surface of the moon thus, with no weapon strapped to his hip to hold on to instead. Without swords, the warriors feel exceptionally robbed, without armor they feel stripped to bare skin.

From the north-side of the forum, a figure is drawing inevitably towards them—spotted first by Desmond who alerted them to the newcomer—and they turn to the approaching shape sans any other significant movement and remain sitting until it comes to stand before them. Ezio has long dropped his juvenile act by the time the robed man allows his face into moonlight which sheds light on his much-despised identity.

Abbas takes a survey of their faces, tugs his apish lip into a smirk without finding them soft to it, and ends his silence in a spindly:

“So we work together again like in old times.”

“You’re so full of shit I can smell it on your breath,” Desmond retorts after a stretch of pause. Altaïr hides his smile, tones down the indulgent humor that threatens to pull his face into a gloating grin, but he nudges his naked thigh against Desmond’s in silent approval and receives a bump of thigh in return.

“Ah, yes, all is as it once was,” Abbas holds himself above insult just for the words he is about to utter and stuffs himself with enough pride to turn blind eye to their denial of camaraderie, ”Only now I am elevated and your husband is a whore.”

His good eye flits across all three of them as if he yearns for his insult to find all ears but settles gaze on Altaïr at last. He still appears affronted by the fact that Altaïr expects his money back. One among many slights Altaïr had inflicted.

Altaïr doesn’t work like an ox to keeps himself calm. Rather, he looks up at Abbas carefully, deliberately, brazenly displaying a tremendous stretch of his serenity and peace.

“I’d spit in your face but my spittle is too precious to waste on you,” Altaïr says.

Abbas whisks his head towards [Gdila](http://the-king-of-novices.tumblr.com/post/104486350666/live-forever-or-die-trying-the-pantheon-2-10)’s temple—away from Ezio’s domineering presence at his right—and hides the sneer Altaïr suspects is there within the shadows of his hood.

“While you wasted away in camps, Al Mualim installed me on a favored position,” Abbas boasts at last, as if he wasn’t chained to the city because Malik blinded him on one eye at the age of ten, as if he didn’t find comfort in bringing Malik pain throughout these seven years for the maiming inflicted upon his face.

“One he wipes his ass with.”

This time, Altaïr and Ezio don’t hide their revel in Desmond’s insults and launch into a malicious snigger. Their laughter is cut short only moments after by another presence.

From across the expanse of the forum, from its south-side, a disreputable crew is drawing near in utter hush. Altaïr recognizes the man at the forefront as the one he’s seen at Al Mualim’s quarters. There is a fearful row of variously-clad men towing behind him, from a dangerous-looking man with eyes set too far apart to men that looked like huge, uncouth animals.

Scum swells Al Mualim’s mercenary ranks.

The three of them are no more proud of working as part of this group than of having once shared ranks of warriors with Abbas. Their ex-comrade saunters past, to greet the leader of this nightly expedition with a show of cordiality.

“Look at the man ensuring his position by means of his tongue in ass,” Desmond jeers in hushed whisper after Ezio draws closer to their presence on the rim of the fountain.

“Despicable,” Ezio adds before these men can close in on them nigh enough to hear their whispers.

Altaïr feels comfort in the presence of the two of them despite of having to work with the men that approach steadily. He is comforted that Desmond and Ezio speak his thoughts with uncanny matching in sentiment. They are far from grasp of jealousy. They don’t care for the gifts Abbas wishes bestowed upon himself. Abbas has not a trace of skill or interest for positions that do not ensure power. The result of his abject craving is that between constantly seeing the power of these foreigners and hoping to get it, Abbas has come to identify himself to some extent with his betters.

Robert gives the man only enough notice to not allow a sense of disregard to swell in Abbas.

Altaïr tolerates Robert with enough capacity to not disrespect him. He looks like a strict man on the lookout for slackness. He is in a position quite apart from the rest of them and the authority in this assembly is not split among the people but reserved for his privacy only. Altaïr has done different jobs under different commanders during the war. He will serve under a foreigner, if such a man is capable.

Robert comes to stand before them and collects the state of their appearances in a mere instant.

“Disguise yourselves,” he orders.

They pull up their cowls and put their faces in hoods with thick silence and no words of protest. They know artists are always on prowl for sketching late wanderers, but this thought hasn’t crossed their minds as a threat or a damaging occurrence before now. Robert seems to want to preserve anonymity.

“Will you obey all orders given?” Robert questions, one last confirmation before they are to be shackled in obeisance to this man.

“We will not flinch from danger,” Altaïr says.

He fears the answer is not too effective for the man’s demands but his fear turns to ash.

Robert nods and beckons them into standing.

“Let us end discussions then and set mind to purpose.”

Robert sets out followed by this crew and the three warriors tagging along in dead silence. They don’t know the location of their mission, nor its meaning or purpose. They stalk across the rest of the forum in row, towards the direction Abbas came from, towards the temple, and their destination seems to be this imposing structure, since beyond it lies nothing but a hill, and a calm, dark sea.

They don’t climb the steps but go directly for the base-level side-entrances of the first gigantic terrace of the temple and stop short of the first chambers that open directly to the forum floor but inwards descend down to an underground of rooms. There, Robert splits them into several clusters. What is more, he splits the warriors apart by assigning them to different groups. Altaïr feels no more comfortable for the rift driven between them than for the fact that their odd mission seems to have business with priests.

The underground chambers of [Gdila](http://the-king-of-novices.tumblr.com/post/104486350666/live-forever-or-die-trying-the-pantheon-2-10)’s temple are home to priests of various gods.

Altaïr takes a pause long enough to see Ezio and Desmond descend into two other chambers some distance away from him, then follows along and into the subterranean halls lit by torches. Two men remain at the single entrance-and-exit as guards, and though Altaïr can’t divine a single purpose for disturbing priests at such late hour, in the heavy presence of mercenaries he listens to orders and lets his body answer demands absent his will.

From all the doors that flank a single side of the extensive hall, Robert opts for the last one, at the end of the hallway which is marked by a massive wall. They spill into the smallish room in a wave. Inside, two priests are offering prayer to [Gdila](http://the-king-of-novices.tumblr.com/post/104486350666/live-forever-or-die-trying-the-pantheon-2-10). Altaïr needs but an instant to understand that Robert’s presence here is uninvited. They are here to extract some sort of knowledge from priests or bully them into parting from whatever information Al Mualim deems worthy.

The priests scramble to proper footing and look between the handful of faces in an alarmed, unnerved manner as if they’ve expected intrusion of the sort and yet managed to face it unprepared. One gaze, the one belonging to the younger priest who is barely above Malik's age, lands on Altaïr’s face and the warrior feels the shame this gaze brings course down the length of his body, feels the weight of his guilt when he is recognized as a non-foreigner.

“Give your true purpose,” the older priest rasps through throes of anxiety. He is skittish.

The men around Altaïr draw blades. Altaïr follows this motion out of the corner of his eye but doesn't stare to not appear suspicious, and his head is in turmoil. The priests are not to be harmed. The priests are one of the cogs in the machine that drives their city. [Hiba](http://the-king-of-novices.tumblr.com/post/105028879746/live-forever-or-die-trying-the-pantheon-3-10)’s orphanage is almost touching the forum—Altaïr had spent hours in the calming presence of priests. The mere suggestion of bringing harm upon community drives him to feverish nausea. At least Abbas is not in his group to witness his unease or draw attention to it.

“Warnings have been issued,” Robert references some earlier contact, one removed from Altaïr’s knowledge, “You are still refusing to sell the grounds.”

“The holy grounds are not for sale,” the second priest, the younger one, objects in what appears to be a long and worn argument, and Altaïr concurs—he would conduct himself to agreeing openly were he not bound by obedience—but he keeps his mouth sealed and nausea brewing behind it and watches fear stalk across the young priests face freely. Two-three men bear down on them suddenly, they converge in a threatening presence to further drive them into fear, and the priests knot themselves closer to each other during retreat until they are split apart after a brief, feeble scuffle. Both are equally subdued and held hostage, struggling while the rest—everyone except Altaïr—closes in to restrain them like livestock.

“You are the plague! _You are the plague_!” The younger priest hollers as if struck and his howls ring around inside Altaïr’s scull but can’t wake him from the trance and he watches his community being ripped apart in shreds and the bleeding entrails of its core flashing at him while he listens to these last yells of a man who doesn’t call for a savior but for his last words to be heard.

“I’ll see the tongue ripped from your mouth!” Robert growls and it’s the most furious state Altaïr has witnessed him in up to this point. The priest looks to Altaïr for the briefest of moments like catching glimpse of his only door to escape before his vision is arrested as Robert delivers a blow to his head and the priest buckles to knees, blood spreads on floor and cloth in first splatter.

Terror takes a dip in Altaïr’s thoughts at the sight of red.

He stands apart from the rest, with disgraceful incredulity of a man who doesn’t want to get involved in harming his community, of a man who is keeping himself at bay at the urge to protect what he defended for seven years, and he feels like nothing could move his limbs from the clench of obedience that weighs on them like a slab of stone.

One of Robert’s men produces a knife from his tail satchel and makes two swift strokes in the air, as though slashing the priest’s cheeks open.

“Kill the younger one,” Robert orders with his former poise.

Altaïr is stabbed into action.

“Break his arm!” He thunders at Robert.

These men, these mercenaries of Al Mualim, want some sort of consent from priests for their master’s needs, however obscure these needs appear to Altaïr. Altaïr doesn’t torture. But he won’t shy away from beating if that is what will save lives and quicken the obtaining of sanction for Al Mualim’s schemes for the city. It comes to him in delayed discovery that he might have stepped out of turn in front of Robert.

“Apologies,” he promptly corrects himself.

“Fuck apologies,” and there is a smirk on Robert’s face, “Shrewd maneuvering.”

The praise is unwelcome. Robert orders the priest’s arm exposed and tosses the bulk of his broad sword to Altaïr who catches it quicker than he is catching on the implications of Robert’s giving him his sword.

“Break his arm,” he instructs drawing all eyes to Altaïr.

There must be some grander purpose behind Al Mualim’s orders. There must be. The warrior feels his resolve grow soft the more he prods the possibility of harming a priest through his own actions, but these orders, these _foreign men_ mean something to his Master. The very thought is sickening but enough to condition him into obedience. Altaïr wants to vomit his nausea out. He wants to run this sword through these men’s bowels. He wants to bring the priests out, away to safety, he wants. He is helpless. He wants to flee.

“See nerves calmed, fool,” Robert’s command breaks through the faint whimper coming from the floor and through the haze of delirium that keeps Altaïr stagnant.

“Gather yourself and see it done.”

Altaïr doesn’t stray to Robert’s face—one visage that is calm in the depths of this illness of confusion which has infected him. The gleam of tears in the young priest’s eyes and the disfigured fear on his young face is fracturing the bravery he struggles to put on. Yet he is unyielding in his silence. They won't give consent to anything these men are demanding tonight. The youth lies at Altaïr’s feet with arms pressing down on him, but in position he is high above Altaïr. One shoulder in [Zikaron](http://the-king-of-novices.tumblr.com/post/119950551366/god-zikaron-patron-of-death-prophecies)’s hold of arms and yet he doesn’t shrink from death to protect community. Of the two of them, Altaïr is the one delivering blow to what he swore to protect at cost of life. And here, a child, a stranger to warfare, doesn’t evade death to uphold the city.

Imperfections in Altaïr’s obedience appear as tiny cracks. He sways forward, a step, he halts. His free hand trembles and solders into a fist. The result is that he is doing two men’s work—of one who would obey and one who would flee. Deserting is forbidden under severe penalties.

Robert draws the blade from Altaïr’s still hand all of a sudden cutting him in the process. His patience is thin.

Having retrieved his sword he finds leverage in a startling swiftness and drives the end of sword into the youth. He dints a hand’s length of blade into the pliant flesh of his lower belly avoiding spine and hipbone and the victim lurches up from the stab of pain and drives the blade deeper into flesh from the suddenness of this motion but drops to ground with a grisly scream while drawing his insides down the blade as he slumps down.

Robert retracts the blade.

The gruesome scream, so unfamiliar to Altaïr who knows only cries of battle, infuses him with a flush of terror, and overwhelming dread that renders his own pain insignificant. His palm is slashed open and dripping with blood substantial enough that he can feel its warmth as he clasps it to his mouth, to avoid temptation to cover ears while they stretch the youth’s body and let his belly bleed out.

The howl of pain morphs into a stutter of silence as one of the men unleashes an unchecked barrage of kicks and blows and two others—the ones that are not keeping the body down—join in this beating.

The youth faints.

Altaïr breathes his own blood, tastes it on his lips watching the unconscious priest and the hemorrhage that steeps his tunic into a mop of blood. It’s someone’s child dying on the floor, someone’s friend, the member of a community.

An unlabeled sensation gushes through the warrior when he sees one of the men pull at his breeches to free cock from confines. Robert allows it.

The warm stench of piss gives free run to Altaïr’s growing sickness. It doesn’t stop the man from urinating over the beat up, stabbed, bleeding, unconscious body of a youth barely past boyhood. Altaïr stands shell-shocked even as another man moves past him knocking bits and pieces from shelves that fringe the walls and then the tormentor returns swilling water around in a pitcher and empties its contents with a deluge across the youth’s face. What urine is not soaked in clothes washes off, and the youth is slapped and manhandled into consciousness in unkempt roughness.

The youth doesn’t cry when he finds them looming over him but he is near it.

His lip trembles and he keens in pain and tries to fold into himself—a vain attempt brought to halt as soon as he tries to set limbs to motion. The staunch man keeping his ankles chained shifts heaving himself up onto the youth’s knees keeping him fixed in place. He bleeds from mouth and men above him pull tighter on his arms wrenching them, somehow, behind his back and the pain that pierces through puts the boy to writhing and he draws his shoulder blades into a touch until as a man pushes his knee between them putting weight down until the youth’s body looks like it can’t bend anymore, like his spine will crack any instant while they keep his body wrung like a rag.

The boot between his shoulders stomps and the bones rip from shoulder sockets, the pop of ligament snapping precedes a scream that scatters all over the room, ricochets off stone walls and plummets on Altaïr.

The youth breaks into sobs a moment before the restrained older priest does from watching the torture.

It could be Malik in the youth’s place. The thought alone drives Altaïr to digging his bloodied fingers deeper during this clasp of slashed hand on his face and the metallic tang is violent in his nostrils while he meshes skin and bone in his jaw, the pool of blood in his palm smears across his deadened face.

He can’t help this boy.

There is the matter of obedience, the matter of discipline he mangled tonight, the matter of punishments for slights if he were to take the sobbing youth and rush to [Hiba](http://the-king-of-novices.tumblr.com/post/105028879746/live-forever-or-die-trying-the-pantheon-3-10)’s hospital, there is the matter of Al Mualim’s designs, whatever torture or blood they require. It is forbidden to help. Honor forbids him to stay.

The hiccup of sobs shorn the warrior of all trappings of authority. He makes a conscientious decision to dedicate himself to escape. When he swerves to rush out, the scene he fled remains to fester even after his eyes turn from it, it's a secret vein of guilt, running through honor of a warrior like the intestines through a man’s body.

He runs his uninjured hand across roughened texture of the stone while he props himself up on wall keeping mouth sewn to bar nausea that threatens to well up, he achieves a handful of steps and nothing more before a large hand fastens onto his shoulder and he swirls around staring wildly into Robert’s incensed visage.

“Would you come to grips, man?!” Robert growls unsettling Altaïr’s frail balance after he gives his shoulder a shove, “You want me to flay your husband instead?”

Altaïr jolts up, his imbalance turned to naught, his nostrils flare with fear-or-rage-or-terror.

“Struck the mark near, did I?”

“My husband is unstained—“

“No man is unstained by the deeds of his husband.”

A chilling scream tears from the chamber at the end and rakes Altaïr’s body with fresh guilt, it tangles with the second shriek and squeals of agony, and remorse is plain on Altaïr’s face. Robert shakes his head at his squeamishness. This is not what warriors were hardened for. Not for harming community. Not for torturing innocents for ulterior motives. Robert thrusts him off, Altaïr almost stumbles to ground.

“Scram. Don’t speak of this unless you want your husband to pay for your slights.”

Altaïr stares after Robert as the man retreats and the door falls into lock behind him muffling moans of agony. He gulps for fresh air finding the stuffy stench of blood and guilt instead, feels the faded imprint of Robert’s hand in his shoulder while he rights himself into walking. To escape. To escape if he is unable to make amends for what he left in his wake.

Altaïr is starving for fresh air and silence. For a moment of peace. He teeters off, then past the men guarding the exit and scrambles out into the open half-mad with guilt, confusion, fear.

On the forum is Desmond, no different than Altaïr.

Altaïr is getting weaker and weaker but his body runs itself on its own accord and fuels him enough to reach Desmond—a disturbed, lone figure swathed in darkness—to stand upright enough to face him without shame that sits heavy on his shoulders (where Robert’s bloody hand has been) and they look into each other's eyes feeling like two strangers, until the hollow ring of steps pushes Altaïr to casting a wild look over his shoulder. He watches Ezio lurch forward into their vicinity, bereft of breath, with disgust smeared across his white face.

Altaïr couldn’t utter a sound even if he put formidable effort into this action. No one speaks. They swap looks, agape and feverish, and neither covets to see the other in the state they are in, they look more corpses than men, but it’s another moment before any of them can dislodge from the place.

They split apart with nary a word.

The night shivers around them.

 

* * *

 

Altaïr barges into his home like possessed.

He carries himself straight to bedroom, finds it empty. The sheets lay untouched, the two quilts—or two halves of one—undisturbed. Malik is not in bed. Malik is not in the house.

Altaïr stills. His hands dart up to rake nails down his scull to quell the burst of fear and he almost knocks himself on the bed shouting his name.

And then, against all odds, Malik’s face peeks from that quirky little corner Altaïr didn’t know what to do with when he bought the place, and Malik nudges the heavy curtain aside into the smallest gap and peers at Altaïr with his dim, dark gaze. A relief shivers down Altaïr’s spine and climbs up in form of elation that settles in depths of his chest and from there spreads around.

Malik sweeps the curtain aside entirely to let moonlight in and remains silent. He expects words or some question. There are better ways to disturb his mute coziness than Altaïr charging in looking wild and beastly with a smear of blood across mouth and cheek. He had hoped for another peaceful night sans husband and he’d rather not have the animal in his bed lest he bares teeth again.

“Why are you there? You’re not sleeping?” Altaïr says grimly after the impact of relief wastes away.

Malik knits his brows.

Altaïr says nothing further but looks like a man brimming with untold words. His face is bloody but without visible injury, pale and swollen with disorientation and some inner turmoil he’s so openly displaying. A path leads the man towards the raised edge of Malik’s secret corner, it stops, hesitates, and turns to loop around towards the statues of [Nokem ](http://the-king-of-novices.tumblr.com/post/104486337526/live-forever-or-die-trying-the-pantheon-1-10)and [Hiba](http://the-king-of-novices.tumblr.com/post/105028879746/live-forever-or-die-trying-the-pantheon-3-10) that bask in darkness. It is not quite the path Altaïr had expected, yet his body is in blaze with nervous unrest and he rubs and chafes across his stained face looking around wildly, until no corner of the room is left unseen.

Malik follows the outlandish way in which his husband conducts himself forgetting for a moment that Altaïr had promised to keep them separate at night, watches how his undomesticated gaze settles at last before the warrior slithers off towards the statues as if called away by sudden need for prayer. To Malik’s utter amazement, Altaïr seats himself before Nokem—not cross-legged but with knees joined while sitting on calves—and puts cupped palms upward in prayer. As if he wants to pray himself to calmness.

“He won’t hear you,” Malik says without malice, “You’ve no revenge in you.”

Malik gives himself to confusion. He knew a mission for Al Mualim wouldn’t bode well, but he doesn’t inquire, doesn’t feel interest pique at him until he realizes that Altaïr is having a breakdown. He takes Malik’s advice to heart even through the haze of delirium and rises again.

A breakdown. Of like he never knew before. In war, he had two loyalties to rely on—to Al Mualim, to awaiting husband. Tonight he has neither. A dead, cold marriage, a husband not offering comfort, Al Mualim issuing inexplicable orders, priests tortured, foreigners assaulting his community. A breakdown only half-hidden by the mask of sudden stillness.

“I disobeyed Al Mualim’s orders,” Altaïr realizes in a whisper.

Malik vaults from the massive window sill that is set deep into the outside of the wall and his silence crumbles completely at these words.

“This will set every tongue in the city wagging! Now all will know about your _obedience_ —how will you find a job!?”

Altaïr drops down to look at the riled face looking up at him, he watches Malik but sees only a babyish-yet-mature concern for things removed from loyalty and principle and honor.

“You don’t understand... They assaulted and humiliated a man who did not deserve such treatment...”

Malik understands little. He doesn’t know who ‘they’ are, he knows less who ‘a man’ is, and he hosts a brief hope that maybe soon Altaïr will seize the mantle of lies from his master’s shoulders and expose the beast beneath. He should address all this, he should, but his attack swerves without his consent or direction, to matters more close at heart.

“So like you’ve treated me? Well maybe then I can find it in my heart to sympathize, having endured treatment of same kind—“

“You put words in my mouth and deeds on my hand and manipulate the conversation towards accusation of me,” Altaïr growls—the first real strength in voice he found since leaving the temple underground—and looms over Malik but retreats only a moment after, “We cannot find common word like this...”

“If you are displeased with me then release me. Divorce or wed me to another,” Malik insists, stubbornly.

It’s as if the mere suggestion of anything of the like disperses Altaïr’s agitated state and transfers all attention into anger. He sets himself as a threatening menace over Malik again taking advantage of his height, he’s  approaching an old and ugly jealousy he thought dead by now.

“I’d sooner part with my own _cock_!”

“I can arrange that, too,” Malik utters in a wisp of breath barely audible, his quip misses its target.

“If you whisper wishes of leaving again see me turn ugly,” Altaïr snarls, in a fury uncontrollable, and Malik has to back away, ”To cling to a life beyond these walls is to see your heart parted from your chest!”

Malik’s minds flits back to Leonardo’s warning. His husband’s fury is not unfamiliar but he considers reaching for his sword or escaping the beast that may indeed have the capacity to beat him as punishment. Something changes then. Altaïr recoils.

Altaïr’s anger is formidable but incomplete, he is striving to render his violent outburst down to what it actually is—a mindless moment in wounded confusion. Malik doesn’t distance himself, not entirely, but he looks to him with caution and Altaïr grapples with the aftermaths of his outburst and blames it on his headless state. It’s not wise to fall into Malik’s traps in his fatigued state.

“Why don’t you just release me or drive me away if I’m destroying your ideals...?” Malik asks.

Altaïr tries, as he has vainly tried before, but he can’t rid himself of senseless jealousy.

“This home is a pale shadow, absent your light.” And had he been any saner tonight, Altaïr might have laughed at the naked truth he didn’t even attempt to wrap in some shield before presenting it to Malik like this.

“Divorce such idea from your mind,” Altaïr entreats, and remembers the folly of his former outburst, “I do not think before I speak. My thoughts are elsewhere,” he says, rapidly revising his addition. Altaïr’s chest constricts at the thought of losing his husband. The house and materials mean nothing. They can be sold, bought, and sold again. Malik is all he has in this world, even if it’s a loyalty barely hanging by a thread.

“Then break open head and share them...” Malik urges on.

Were it only so easy.

Altaïr’s heart is already knocked open, ready for his husband to openly inform it of foolishness and dishonor of his actions. If he removed his heart from chest and left it out in the unguarded for Malik, it would generally be taken and trampled upon. His hope for a close husband goes back to its grave.

Altaïr puts a cork on his thoughts and won’t speak anymore.

He lifts hands anew to rub his face in abject anticipation of Malik’s pending decision—whether he can sleep in bed or in home at all, and he will sleep at doorstep with sword in hand if that’s what it takes to protect his husband—and he doesn’t realize that Malik is staring at the length of his forearm with growing alarm on his face.

He finds, for the first time now, the source of blood on Altaïr’s sullied face. Altaïr’s hand is blood-soiled, his arm streaked from wrist to elbow with caked rivulets of varying lengths of red. He’s not wont of touching Altaïr on his own free will—unless this touch involved pain and punches—but he ventures down that unsafe passage and decides to have a look at the extent of his husband’s injury, to help Altaïr clean up and stumble upon whatever else lies until the end of that passage.

Malik pulls his hand down first, examines the reach of damage, the depth of wound, whatever he can discern from its messy state, and then he tugs Altaïr along steering him towards the bed and maneuvers him into sitting on the edge.

He orders Altaïr to stay put and doesn’t return for what seems like eternity to Altaïr, though there can’t be more than what you would need to polish an already clean sword.

Malik restores himself to Altaïr’s presence with many an addition—a large bowl with warm water, a clean cloth and bathing towel, a tray teeming paraphernalia Altaïr couldn’t tell apart. He feels naïve excitement at whatever Malik intended to do and he wouldn’t protest even if he decided to poison him right here, he follows feverishly as Malik puts his double-nozzled lamp on floor and fixes the bowl across Altaïr’s lap after laying the towel out across it.

Malik is most probably cleaning his minor wound because he doesn’t want his sheets soiled—a hard comfort softened by knowledge that Malik will allow him into bed tonight, now when he needs it most. And as if Malik’s opulent gear isn’t hint enough, Altaïr’s watching of his husband’s endeavors obtains him an unexpected glimpse into the thoroughness of Malik’s doting.

He immerses Altaïr’s hand into the bowl and lets the lukewarm water soften the caked blood sticking around the gash in layers.

There is a less-than-slim chance that Malik is doing this because he cares but Altaïr seizes the fantasy by the tail and drags it back for a moment, to arrest the image of it. He closes his eyes and gradually grows into the dream while Malik wipes the stains away from his face, rubbing across his cheeks and mouth with warm-soaked cloth in light, deliberate strokes despite the lack of injury on his face. Once finished, Malik dabs the moisture away with the dry end catching its fabric across the stubble on Altaïr’s jaw—a gentle, insubstantial friction against skin he doesn’t protest. He weaves through this dream until Malik migrates to his hand again. And though the sting in his lacerated hand awakens, there is a strange harmony in watching his young husband tend to his injury, a sense of peace which isolates him from all horrors that will happen outside their house tonight. He allows himself into Malik’s nimble hands and feels himself growing closer to his husband after every careful wipe across palm and around the cut that’s pulsing with unnoticed hurt.

His hand is cleaned and the gash cleansed.

Malik picks an item up—a pitcher the contents of which whiff strongly of mixed alcohols—and he holds Altaïr’s palm open above the vessel without stretching the wound out again and pours a steady trickle over it letting the strong liquid seep from Altaïr’s hand into the dirtied water in the bowl. Altaïr doesn’t know whether to laugh or gasp while the alcohol stings him.

He is aware that Malik sees not a husband in him but another community member, and the care he bestows on him is dictated by a sentiment that’s instilled in every child from small on until it turns into a crafted instinct to nurse and nurture the community and its members. Malik is only doing what he would do for anyone in the community.

The trickle shrivels up and Malik seals the jar allowing residual antiseptic to soak into the cut tissue to forestall infection and turns to his tray. From it, instead of bandages the warrior expects, he picks up a cup of steaming tea to put into Altaïr’s unscathed hand where it melts into Altaïr’s fingers with its warmth putty against his skin. The tea is herbal, it smells of some aromatic plant Altaïr can’t quite decipher, but having remembered that there is no fire in the hearth behind his back he connects the pieces into solving the riddle of the origin of Malik’s hot water. His earlier absence wasn’t as much a product of gathering his medicines as descending down onto the first story and into the boiling room—the room where water from aqueducts to showers is warmed for community purposes, a room where you could find lukewarm water at worst if the fire in your own home has been snuffed.

The tea is good beyond measure. Altaïr sucks it all down in one draught without stopping to take a breath and it seems to go straight into his veins and courses round his body like new blood.

Malik takes the drained cup and puts it away returning with some curious ointment and bandages. Something in Altaïr’s chest nags him to let Malik know how appreciated his doting is, but he holds stubborn silence and as the excuse gives Malik’s dotting of strong-smelling ointment across the gash of his wound and wish to avoid disturbing his work. A feeble excuse. Malik takes pause, scowls at Altaïr’s hand, as if noticing for the first time their overall poor state, the roughness of his calluses, and coarseness of skin that hasn’t seen the nourishment of ointments in a long time. Before dressing the wound, he singles out one of his own salves—those Leonardo takes painstaking care to produce, those he’s been using as liniment for his own hands for years despite gloves to protect skin from washing soaps—and he rubs the smooth, greasy texture around the gash and balms his other hand comparably.

Leonardo’s occasional lessons given to community pay off at the most unexpected of times. Instruction, appended by his inventions, has proved useful beyond measure more than once.

The wound is dressed and Altaïr profoundly saturated in the contentment of a false dream when Malik suddenly prods his chest with a set of clean nightclothes and the implicit message of this discloses itself to Altaïr without words. He is invited into the bed. He is allowed to remain.

“You let me invade your esteemed lodgings for tonight?” Altaïr reads the words from Malik’s actions aloud and gets no answer in return. There is no humor in his tone, not a dram of it, and Malik’s face is an unusual solemn silence as he bends with precipitous suddenness, near enough to put chin on Altaïr’s shoulder in this bizarre position (a move Malik steadily avoids), and he tugs at Altaïr’s tunic helping him take it off to relieve the strain on bandaged palm.

Conversation is lacking even while Malik collects his gear and mops up the aftermaths of this binding of a wound, and he is presented with no other choice but to pull himself up into the bed to wait for Malik’s arrival.

The split of one quilt into two still bothers him.

Perhaps there is some hope that Malik might allow himself into his arms tonight but he doesn’t acknowledge it. Malik returns at last to put out the lamp and slip beneath his sheets and quilt, and just when Altaïr’s heart has warmed itself up into some hope—delicate and shaky, standing on thin, spindly legs—Malik rolls over and presents Altaïr with a dim view of his back.

The curtain is rung down. He is looking again at the naked reality of his marriage.

It’s good to exercise self-restraint when things are going well. Or when he isn’t sure that his advances will be well-received. This, along with the notion that he’s sworn to never cross his husband’s side of bed again, is what drives him into escape from disappointment and into an attempt of sleep.

It’s a considerable amount of time before they both fall into slumber and a shorter extent of time before Malik is woken by no fault of his own.

First there is an unstrapped twitching of limbs behind his back not unlike that from his first night spent with Altaïr. He blinks himself to a slow shutting of eyes and attempts new sleep finding no surprise in this as Altaïr’s disquiet in sleep seems to be a common occurrence. There is but a moment of peace before the twitching grows more violent until it’s a nuisance and obstacle to sleep.

Malik sighs through his craving for slumber, promises himself sleep as soon as he turns over to examine the state of Altaïr.

His husband is in oblivion’s grasp but clutched by claws of some greater troubles he can’t escape even in dreams. His body, so powerful and magnificent in daylight, is now curled up into a tense coil. Whatever nightmare assails him is making Malik restless in return. Altaïr is moving and shifting in sleep, the fingers of his injured, left hand contract at sporadic intervals almost forming into a fist for the fraction of a moment, his other hand is clawing at the sheets or pillow depending on where it shifts.

Malik watches with pity licking at his chest. His own face twitches in response to Altaïr’s sudden flinch and fraction of restless moan.

Malik doesn’t know that his husband only recently absconded from a traumatic experience, but he feels the prickling of empathy and a sudden block in attempt to wake him, he struggles helplessly through it, but his struggles grow more resigned, until he can’t distinguish any other sparks of resistance to waking Altaïr from the nightmare that’s robbing them both of proper sleep.

Before he urges himself into any movement, Malik explains this decision to himself with the need for sleep.

When he reaches across the gap between them to put his hand on Altaïr’s shoulder he can hardly imagine doing anything different. His body protests against the lack of sleep but not against this movement to wake Altaïr.

He shakes him off sleep stirring him to waking in order to put a stop to his antics.

Altaïr rouses with a sudden start, as if tumbled from the trauma-stiffened dream. He hurries out of it with a perturbed face and protesting muscles as early as Malik starts shaking him, and then he finds Malik facing him with the hand still lingering on his shoulder and pours the calmest look into his haggard face that he can muster.

“Sleep does not come?”

“Nor is it deserved,” Altaïr whispers back.

They stare at each other through dimness, through silence start stretches across the gap between them. Malik blinks and his hand launches into retreat, away from the proximity of Altaïr’s warm shoulder, and Altaïr is startled into action.

He knows he is playing his very last card by bestowing unwonted affection, yet he must move quickly or see opportunity fade. To halt this retreat, his right hand shoots out and seizes Malik’s wrist, and they remain linked thus for a moment—Malik in confusion and Altaïr in hesitance.

A smallish frown settles on Malik’s brow but he doesn’t pull his hand into the safety of his quilt. He is reluctant to offer his hand but Altaïr’s very peace seems to be tethered to it. Altaïr attempts his luck and smooths his hand down Malik’s wrist to take his husband’s hand into his own and Malik is stiff, at first, but his body mellows out into relaxation and he consents to their hands remaining joined for tonight.

A hand, that is all. It is very little but it is heartbreaking and heartwarming, both at once.

Altaïr links their fingers and commences a slow pull, bit by bit, drawing the captured hand across his side of bed and nearer to himself, until he is able to lay lips upon it.

Through a gap of mind which is busy reveling in this closeness Altaïr tries to think of anything that provided such comfort before. It’s useless, quite useless. There is nothing to relate to except his ordinary cribbing and cramming of dreams about an awaiting husband during the short rests between battles. Until now, dreams were his only comfort.

Altaïr is inordinately fond of the scent of Malik’s hands, their clean softness and soapy smell. They are as delicate in texture as his neck. Until now, they have been driving him mad with wonder of how they would feel on his own skin, how it would feel to take his husband’s hands and scatter kisses across them, or hold them between his own. He had meticulously noted all these particulars and he is jotting down more while he thumbs across the bumps of Malik's knuckles and then across arches that make the gentle slopes of his clean nails. He drags wetted lip across the tips of his fingers, and breathes the calmness this hand provides.

Malik watches entranced, feeling the silky swish on the back of his hand as Altaïr glides his cheek across it between squeezing and nuzzling and peppering of kisses. His stupor lasts long enough that he settles into it and doesn’t attempt to extract his hand from Altaïr’s possessive hold.

Movement is receding slowly until the gust of Altaïr’s breath is turning into something deeper, calmer, and blowing across his skin in a slow, long draft. A hand shouldn’t feel like having this much power over a warrior.

And even though Altaïr, too, acknowledges its power, he knows that weapons of this type do not smash a man’s life—they build it. He is bursting with relief of having been allowed to attend to this soft hand. He links their fingers anew and keeps the hand far across the territory of his half of bed, at which point he engrosses himself into the attempt to discover what it feels like to have a husband without making a stop to acknowledge Malik’s motives of offering his hand. He cheerfully dismisses reality. He has hungered for this for a long, long time.

“Confide in me and lift your burden,” comes Malik’s raspy voice, made soft to entice speech.

Altaïr swallows and sighs the tension out of his body and says nothing.

For a moment it seems to Malik that the faint rhythm of his husband’s breath has been suspended, that he has awakened to ensure he is still holding onto Malik’s hand, before sinking again into sleep.

If Malik shifted the tip of his middle finger he could count the calluses atop Altaïr’s palm. Instead, he lies still.

His initial intentions have drifted aslant and missed target, but he disregards failed quest for word and listens.

Now the rhythm has continued, so low that Malik can hardly distinguish it from his own breath, while he lies and listens. He watches how Altaïr falls asleep holding onto his hand. Oh, and he would ask a thousand of things—he would talk to Altaïr about all he yearned to talk about, but he doesn’t.

He watches him sleep.

 

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> EzioLeo will come, worry not. It will be wonderful.
> 
> A death catcher looks something like [this](http://imgur.com/v3QmHiU). 
> 
> Your headcanons, thoughts, and observations are what keeps me alive, I swear to Nokem almighty...


	5. Chapter 5

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> City map is [updated](http://prezi.com/gip9vov8u-e1/?utm_campaign=share&utm_medium=copy&rc=ex0share). 
> 
> I made [a masterpost](http://the-king-of-novices.tumblr.com/post/108753402976/live-forever-or-die-trying-masterpost) with everything story-relevant covered so far. (all god identities are collected here) I must thank all people who participated in unraveling identities, it was great fun hearing your suggestions and I thank you all. ♥
> 
>  **This chapter may be disturbing** and a bit of a shock. When you reach the very end, **the very last sentence** , you will understand why its place is here. (This is the _only_ visit to the past we will have.)
> 
> Thanks to lovely [annyfranny](http://annyfranny.tumblr.com/) whose headcanons about a certain flute and marriage procedure I sneaked into this chapter. ♥

 

The last that Malik saw of his home was not his mother, it was her knife.

The frightening gleam of her knife lingers in his mind’s eye but for a moment longer, his mother’s threat to kill him unless he makes off to hide rings in his ears for far longer than that.

The last time Malik saw his mother, he was thrust through the secret exit of their villa, in his hold the tiny hand of his brother—a child wrung from bed, torn from home, with no shoes, no sandals, only a flute in hand. Malik is too small, too removed from the notion of treachery, to understand the reasons his mother hasn’t provided. He obeys because he is told so. He obeys his mother’s threat because remaining loyal tonight is being disloyal, and he understands enough to know that mother has bestowed a vast burden on his small shoulders.

Malik is ten years young when he is driven out of home and ordered to hide, with Kadar’s frail hand in his. Kadar has barely grown into his fifth year when he is seized from bed and forced out of home, for reasons that will forever be withheld from him, with Malik’s small hand around his.

The sky is alive with stars, the city ablaze with fires. It reeks of blood and treachery and ash.

Malik’s could hide inside the silent bath complex, situated a street south from their home. He could, but the entrance is barred by night. Inside, there is no one. The walls are like a giant’s fence, the gate locked. Behind his back, a vast sob breaks from Kadar’s mouth.

“Where is mama?” he moans with atrocious volume, a question that can only invite trouble and Malik is jammed into a corner, a pup caught in a trap and moved by mere instincts. He tugs him, yanks him along to let his helplessness and Kadar’s loudness race through his mind as he looks about for another exit, another hiding place. From the spot they are passing at present, Malik can catch a glimpse of the main road two long, narrow streets up ahead, towards north. He is heading there, his eyes hurt from lack of blinking, his heart thuds painfully while he moves towards what feels like a wandering out of trap, or stumbling right into it.

Before they can reach the tail of the street to investigate, a collection of warriors marches past in quick step and the brothers swerve between two properties, two villas, to wait until they pass. The grid of streets they thread is open from four sides, with no street safe enough to provide shelter, and he feels exposed and at risk. If they could reach the temple, or the theater beyond, it might provide sanctuary. Until morning. Until next day. Until they can flee from the city.

When they reach the meeting joint of a side and main street, they halt. From all corners of the city ragged families are pouring onto the streets to find escape, or to be slaughtered, from various streets around deafening cries are twining with crazed demands for blood, mingling, mixing, until all they hear is a disjointed swelling of screams, shrieking, yells. The number of escapees is dwindling, but some spill onto the streets. All of them are nobles. Of the common folk, there is no trace.

The temple is a gargantuan building sitting on a giant’s steps at the end of the forum. Its silence beckons.

Malik’s knees are weak, two worthless lifeless knobs, fear is morphing his limbs into rigidness, into paralysis shattered only by fear for his brother. Kadar is scared but Malik is more. Kadar is scared for himself, Malik is scared for both.

Quicker still is Malik to wake from this stiffness when he spots a swaying mass of warriors sweeping forth from the Chamber of Memories in a steady, frightening march and down towards the navel of the city where the two main streets cross each other. The brothers sidle up to a wall, they are still enough, a motionless bundle huddled into the brick wall of a villa, small enough to not be noticed.

Malik follows until they remove themselves from their sight, he peeks from their spot at intervals, peeks over his shoulder when screams shake his protesting muscles into a panicked flinch, peeks to assure himself that Kadar is there, a mere crumb of a child, even if he feels him clutch at his back with small hands. Malik rummages up-and-down the street searching for other warriors, and when he finds none for several long moments, he feels certain he will never get beyond this chance if he doesn’t move now.

The main street is strewn with gravel, with grit, with dirt. Kadar is barefoot. He won’t manage on feet.

The routine of carrying Kadar on his back is not unfamiliar. Acquired through game before, now it proves useful, and he settles into the weight when he prompts Kadar onto his back and secures his hands at the back of his brother’s knees, and allows whatever extension of time is surpassing his usual bodily limits to be swallowed by urgency, the pain of it remains unnoticed.

His longing gaze booms gloomily past the main street and to the forum, then up the stairs towards the temple, he stiffens his limbs into a quick run, and with a quick start he hurries out with face dirty with fear and Kadar clutching his neck. It doesn’t obstruct his breathing. He doesn’t breathe. Between his bravery and fearlessness there is a great joke. Malik carries them towards the temple because there are no people on temple grounds, he draws them towards the theater because it’s dark. In the blaze of fires around, darkness is their only shelter. Darkness is where the safety lies.

Crossing the main street doesn’t encourage hope, but with Kadar’s tear-streaked face and Malik’s protesting muscles they manage to cross it, they manage to run across the paved forum towards the first story of stairs. The temple is dim, but the darkness of the theater at its back is what encourages Malik onwards. Kadar’s small hand thrusts itself into Malik’s the moment his bare feet find the first stair, and they ascend hand in hand, breathing the sour mixture of ash and fear.

The temple complex has always appeared to Malik like a giant’s steps up to heavens. Like three layers of their mother’s cake stacked onto one another. They needn’t go past the first. The first layer is where the entrance, the only entrance, to [Nokem](http://the-king-of-novices.tumblr.com/post/104486337526/live-forever-or-die-trying-the-pantheon-1-10)’s theater lies. There are no other entrances.

Up the first layer they climb and down the grounds they run, towards the entrance into the bowels of a dark theater, a floodlit tunnel illuminated by the spires of fire around the city, where once the property of nobles stood untouched.

They pass the tunnel and break the silence inside the theater, Malik’s steps ring. Their patter is carried forth across the imposing semicircle of a myriad steps, it feels as if all sound converges at a single point at the podium down below and spreads outwards from there bursting to the very porticus that runs around the outermost edge of the theater supporting the statues of [Nokem](http://the-king-of-novices.tumblr.com/post/104486337526/live-forever-or-die-trying-the-pantheon-1-10). In their presence, Malik feels a sliver of safety coursing his limbs until it pours down into his wrist, into his fingers that clutch Kadar’s tiny hand and he tightens hold pulling his brother along.

Responsibility doesn’t allow the luxury of fear.

It’s not right.

He is a child of [Nokem](http://the-king-of-novices.tumblr.com/post/104486337526/live-forever-or-die-trying-the-pantheon-1-10) and children of Nokem are warriors, they don’t give way to fear. The stage floor is lone, there is no one. Its high back-wall supported by columns rests doused in moonlight. [Daga](http://the-king-of-novices.tumblr.com/post/105887755561/live-forever-or-die-trying-the-pantheon-4-10)’s tears are bright on the skies this night. Malik considers what path to take, what shelter to seek, there is only so much he can see with [Daga](http://the-king-of-novices.tumblr.com/post/105887755561/live-forever-or-die-trying-the-pantheon-4-10)’s tears as his only lamp. Across the midriff of this imposing semi-circular edifice, along the length of the wall between two belts of seat rows, several blind tunnels are chiseled into the bulk of dressed concrete. What is meant to provide visual gratification and decorum in variations of structure will tonight be used for sheltering life. Malik is half-mind to take his sandals off, to staunch the hollow clap of soles against the paved passage between cavea, but he will have need of them.

His legs carry him to the middle tunnel, the one set right across the back-wall of the stage, at a considerable height which leaves the podium far below. They announce themselves to the safety of the blind tunnel. At its end is the only source of light, an open arch with outlook onto the hill that winds around the back of Nokem’s theater like a shield. If Malik propped himself on toes high enough, he could, perhaps, see the gap between the top of the hill and the top of the theater arch, and in that gap would be the vast stretch of the dark sea bathing in moonlight. Malik heard older boys boast of feats like jumping from the tunnel arches onto the hill unscathed but he had shrugged them off as exactly that—boasting. Even if he could jump from the tunnel onto the hill without plummeting into the narrow, frightening crack between the steep hill and the back of theater, Kadar would not be able to. Even if they managed together, nothing was waiting for them beyond the hill, nothing but the rocky cliffs of sea and darkness beyond the horizon. Malik doesn’t stray to thoughts of jumping off. Had he wanted to be up the winding range of hill, he would have ran past the forum, past the temple complex and the theater, and tried to climb up a more easier route right off the back of theater.

He doesn’t stray towards the end of the tunnel. Its middle is dim enough to be called dark, and he sidles up to one of the vaulted walls and lowers into a crouch, Kadar follows his antics religiously. He is at unease with Kadar closer to the exit and he shifts putting himself between his brother and the possible source of threat. His safety for Kadar’s life.

After he sits, he is reminded of the state of their half-dress, of Kadar’s lack of sandals, however inane the thought compared to the cloak of dread that wraps itself around them while they huddle breathing fear and terror, breathing helplessness. Two children expelled from home, forced onto the street, coerced into saving their own skins.

Malik is young but old enough to feel the strain of a new fear that has settled on his own hideous expression and notched itself into his brows—an abominable expression of weakness. He stares off into the blackness of the wall across until he forgets what daylight looks like, his limbs are frozen until the motionless arm wound around Kadar’s small shoulders shifts through the shake of his brother’s body. Kadar breaks into tears. Then sobs. Malik is near it, he sweats with dread, he sees the snakes of fire licking at the sky in his mind’s eye, hears the faraway chant of screams.

Kadar carves himself a path to mold against Malik, his face squashed and flattened against Malik’s neck until it’s wet with tears, his small arms thrust into Malik’s lap between chest and bent, frozen knees, until the flute he is clutching is digging into the soft of Malik’s belly, and then up into his solar plexus. Kadar looks to him to keep him safe and duty weighs down on the older brother with doubled severity. His many worries fight among themselves.

Kadar’s sobs don’t fade out, they deepen gradually from frosty to earnest and calming him is a physical necessity, the duty of an older brother who knows that crying tonight is a debauch more than a relief. Crying is for the wealthy. Crying is for the safe. Or for the destitute. Malik is not yet poor enough to cry, he yet treasures Kadar’s life. He has no sensation of poverty, for even if he loses his home, his still has his sibling.

Kadar’s face is almost entirely wet, it’s flooded with tears, his nose is clogged, and Malik has nothing to brush it all away, has not even a blanket to keep them from cold’s grasp tonight, but he pulls his sleeve down to his wrist and hooks a hand inside to pull it up and clean the worst of this tearful outburst while he keeps Kadar away from his neck. He won’t part from Malik and the elder is pressed into giving up more than just his side, he shifts splaying his thighs open and Kadar shuffles up to slot himself more securely inside Malik’s hold and Malik keeps his head up, runs his naked thumbs down his face when the position doesn’t allow for keeping the sleeve hooked on hand. The bleak moonlight that slants in at the end of the tunnel is generous enough that he can discern Kadar’s plump face, that he can brush off tears without poking his eyes. The brightest blue of his eyes is dimmed by darkness but the welling of fresh tears glimmers when the lazy limbs of moonlight stretch far enough to pet across his face. Malik strokes across briny skin, below eyes and towards temples, until his antics make no sense anymore, until his thumbs are as wet as Kadar’s eyes, he rubs the tears away but new keep coming. He emulates what mother does to Kadar when he cries, mimics what she ought to do to him (though he harbors no memory of such event) yet his attempts at halting tears meet failure and he knows no other remedy than allowing Kadar’s incessantly sloping body to fall against him, he allows this comfort. Where his gesture failed his proximity compensates. Kadar eases his breath from heaving into long, greedy gulps of air and sags against Malik, chin on his shoulder, frail arms tight around Malik’s ribs, his flute a nagging prodding between their bellies. Malik allows it. He allows all.

He fastens his knees to Kadar’s sides and presses a cheek into his hair, always unruly, always defying obedience, and curls arms around him—he was never closer to his brother than he is tonight. Tonight, they have no other family. Tonight they are two.

Malik is stingy with movement tonight, he shifts if he must, and his limbs are welded to where he first fixed them, until the first hiccup pricks him into movement. The dam breaks, it’s bound to break, and a barrage of hiccups follows. They don’t excel in volume but the strength of their convulsions shakes Kadar’s entire frame and Malik’s arms wound around him can’t remain still. Their petite squeaks are loud in Malik’s ear but listening to Kadar’s hiccups is more pleasant than the deafening silence. It begs to be stopped, for their own safety, and Malik must throw dice to attempt comfort, must risk more to plunge them into unwanted silence again.

He rasps the first verse out before he moves his arm, and when his lips fall into proper shape and his voice forms into proper sound his arm does launch into movement and strokes over Kadar’s shaking frame. He could sing better. He hates the shivery breath of his lullaby, he hates the color of his tone, but his song soothes Kadar into a hush and its purpose is well-met.

During his soft shushing time goes astray and the notion of it is lost on him.

He listens to the rhythm to Kadar’s fickle breathing more intently than he listens for sounds outside the scope of their shelter, his song dwindles to naught but his arms find no rest, they stroke up-and-down-and-up-and-down until he isn’t sure whom of them two he’s comforting, he strokes even when the cadence of Kadar’s breathing begins to shift, he feels the change beneath his palms, he feels it through the press of their chests.

“Play the flute, brother,” Kadar whispers earnestly, and his words are important. Nothing is quite real to Malik but this whisper murders the fearful uproar inside him and fills his chest to brim with sadness. He doesn’t know the flute. He's never learned. He can’t tell Kadar.

Children of Nokem are blessed with inclination to music and song, like their father. The children of Nokem, the nobles, receive instruments upon birth, it’s their talisman, their birth amulet. Malik’s is a harp, one as tall as Kadar, and three times as heavy. Forever lost to fire. Kadar’s is a pan flute, the beautifully-crafted set of five small pipes prodding at Malik’s chest. The sole reason for its being here tonight is that Kadar sleeps with it, that his pan flute is the only remaining memento of home that wouldn’t slip from his grasp.

Malik doesn’t know flute. He would play it if he knew, even if the sound were to spread around. To hide that he doesn’t know, Malik blames inability on the latter.

“Can we pray to father then?” Kadar begs, hopeful.

Malik’s reluctance wants to stop him.

The business of pacifying Kadar is proving far graver to be satisfied with mere petting and song. Was he as difficult to placate at that age as his brother is? He has no one to ask and his mind hates it, it’s unnerved by it, he migrates to other thoughts. To soothe Kadar he is coerced into setting off towards the nearest statue. The difficulty of his decision lies not within the distance—the outer ridge of the theater is flanked by several statues of Nokem—it lies within the departure from their shelter. To lull Kadar into a semblance of ease, Malik must guide them out, to the nearest statue. A risk made necessary by unfortunate circumstances.

They forsake the tunnel.

They ascend the nearest set of stairs.

There is not much distance and the statue gleams stately up there beneath the moon. Nokem’s likeness is crafted as all other city statues are. With real weapons. Their body is stone, their weapons steel. Where [Nokem](http://the-king-of-novices.tumblr.com/post/104486337526/live-forever-or-die-trying-the-pantheon-1-10)’s spear is a real one, Barzel’s flail is an iron one, [Gdila](http://the-king-of-novices.tumblr.com/post/104486350666/live-forever-or-die-trying-the-pantheon-2-10)’s shield and sword are steel ones. They are stone but their gear is not. To touch it is most heinous sacrilege. On the ridge of the theater, the glint of Nokem’s spear is a luster of light hovering above the god’s head. There is—it is hard for a child to express it—a sort of heavy contentment, the contentment well-fed by the sudden proximity to the god, a simple sensation which feels so very intricate. And nothing could be more intricate than their loss of a former life. Malik drinks the sight greedily, revels in the presence of their father to forget the intricacies of their tragedy, when Kadar’s bitty fingers stiffen around his hand while he steers them towards Nokem.

They never get to the outer porticus.

The sight of a warrior turns Malik’s belly into a plummeting to abyss of terror.

Moonlight is bright and cruel.

They are not alone and it’s visible. They see the warrior that stands in the vicinity of the right passage-tunnel as clear as he sees them, across the theater, amid the stairs. The man stands there in full armor for a half-witted moment, as if he didn’t care for finding anyone here, let alone a pair of petrified children. His presence is lone, like that of a man who sought this place out to cower from the chaos beyond, like that of a warrior who would avoid direct conflict if he could help it because beyond the nobles are retaliating and injured and dead abound on both sides, like someone who would reap whatever is left after the first bloodshed instead of risking his own neck. To mere children, he is a threat they exposed themselves to, a monstrous beast running to swallow them alive.

Fear pours rapidly into Malik’s veins, his limbs, his feet, and lastly his mind.

The noise of the man’s first step is deafening.

Descending down to the walking passage is a wasting of time, a luxury not obtainable, with an alternative equally bleak. The children start across the seats instead. The warrior that went afield launches into a run, to catch them before they reach around to the left passage-tunnel. Kadar bursts out into a shriek, there is a din of steps as all three of them shoot into a faster run—a hunter and the hunted, a warrior chasing after two children. Their flight across the seats of cavea is thwarted at every step, hindered by every gap between benches. Their escape is a suffering of panic and ungainly steps, of tugging at a small hand and towing behind the older brother in upset pace.

For a moment of time the noise of running is scarcely slackened. Then there is the first sign of falling over.

The clomping of Malik’s dashing steps expires, the cargo of Kadar’s little hand falls from his grasp and he turns around—he must do this feared motion—to see that Kadar tripped dropping between benches. The warrior is upon them. They will never make it.

Kadar hasn’t yet shuffled up to his bare feet, he is heaving with exhaustion and terror, the man is upon them, it’s too late. It’s always been too late.

“ _Stop_!” Malik yelps and his word goes around, past Kadar, but word alone is not strong enough a barrier between the warrior and them. Malik is pulling Kadar to feet when his presence is upon them like a gust of wind and Malik’s howling, his putting up of hands makes no difference. The man backhands him, he tips off the seat, keels off to the side. The warrior is laying hands on the smaller one because the older will return to him.

Kadar’s shriek rattles him from stupor and up to feet and he springs off before he can register what’s happening two seats above him, he bounds upwards long before he sees hands on Kadar’s neck and the flailing of his brother’s limbs.

Malik groans-growls-moans to give his presence substance as he assails the form that hovers above Kadar putting weight into the choking, he throws the flute he’s been mindlessly holding at his hand before his head can think to pull at the tail of his helmet, and he does take it off, he does attract attention, but not enough to inflict injury, not enough to lessen the hold on his brother’s neck. The man shakes him off like little more than an aggravating fly, an insect, and it’s not until Malik sinks his teeth into a hairy arm that the man responds with more than just a push. The warrior yells, spits a curse, shoves Malik off until the child is plunging more than mere two seats below, until he’s plummeting an entire cavea down to the walking passage, injured, bruised, shaken.

Malik half staggers to his feet, fear ties his knees together, his mind grasps at straws.

Kadar’s thrashing is waning into bleak attempts at tapping and scratching at the man’s lifted chin.

Beyond, in Nokem’s hand, his weapon is gleaming.

When Malik looks back at this moment it’s not knitted with genuine valor but a sham bravery, a foolish heroism. Tonight there are no heroes, the heroes are dead. There is but a child writhing from the grasp of death and a child straining to protect a brother with all means accessible. The closest statue rises a portion above, a more distant portion from where Malik has fallen, but he carries himself with nameless speed, impelled by the protective instinct that swells to remind him of his duty. Luck is not terrible, luck aids him—the statue is that of Nokem. Extracting the spear from Nokem’s hand is nearly effortless. [Gdila](http://the-king-of-novices.tumblr.com/post/104486350666/live-forever-or-die-trying-the-pantheon-2-10)'s sword would have been harder, heavier.

The weapon is real.

Malik doesn’t know how to wield it but it’s instinct that guides him, not skill. He pulls it out of his father’s stony hand, he scurries down the row of seats vaulting from bench to bench, he dashes down, he doesn’t growl, not until he’s near enough to let his presence be known as a surge of growled cries ruptures from his throat and he keeps the spear steady. He aims at the man’s head.

The man flashes up removing intent from the choking, Malik’s aim shifts accordingly with the shift of the man’s head, and the cusp of his spear rams through his eye even as an arm shoots out halt Malik’s aim. Malik doesn’t throw, he aims running, it takes a retaliation from the man’s side to soften the impact, to dodge a far serious injury. The momentum of Malik’s force is halted, it’s broken off, but the damage to the man’s eye has been done. Malik did not kill but he did blind, he did maim. It’s enough. The warrior clasps hands at his bleeding eye, crimson streams down the side of his face generously, he roars like wounded beast. It’s enough.

It’s enough to haul a child in bodily shock from the bench, enough to fare through a handful of steps, and no more than that.

Kadar is not the victim of the second assault.

Malik is snatched from Kadar’s grasp, flung over shoulder like a sack of grain. Malik doesn’t give himself to fear through this position, but through the warrior’s injured fury. Until now, the man has been toying with smaller prey, because they were so weak, because they weren’t meant to cause wound, and the man’s face is bloody and purple with such infamy and fury, his blind rage seeps into Malik making him disoriented, and he doesn’t know what the man intended until he does his piece.

Malik is falling.

His landing is far below him.

Malik has neither time nor skill to angle himself in midair. His stomach is lurching, he is plummeting down below, he is diving into the unknown, he doesn’t know how far off the warrior has thrown him. He is in free-fall and a scream is lodged frozen in his throat.

His unfocused gaze doesn’t catch more than the moonlit mass of crushing waves, it morphs into a dark blur then and he shuts his eyes to the whirl around him, he awaits what must come.

He crashes wham into a blend of rock and earth, the collision smacks against his back, his side, it smacks all over. His burst of cry is too stunning to his own ears. It’s the hill. He tumbles off into rolling, he coughs, spits out a wad of blood, of spittle, of both, he gasps for air. He claws at the rock, panting. There is two-three steps towards the end of the cliff but he digs fingers into rock and dirt and claws into the crevices and gaps. To fall off the wrong side of hill would be his death. The drop-off, the height between the theater ridge down to the top of hill doesn’t suffice to kill, but it promises pain, it promises agony.

Every part of him resists movement.

Above him, where he was hurled from, Kadar is crying for aid. Malik lifts his head wheezing spittle and blood and dread, he lifts his body on elbows scraping and chafing skin, he crawls, he creeps edging forward before he can trust his voice. And yet, the warrior intends different pain on Kadar. He doesn’t toss him off the theater, he is not moving to do so.

Malik watches Kadar’s panicked trashing while the man presses down on his neck again, there, on the proticus where Malik can see. Dread runs thick through Malik’s veins until his own first shriek erupts. It’s no use, it’s useless, it’s vain. It’s giving what was meant to be taken. The man has wandered out to that spot aiming to unfold a play of murder before his eyes, to cheat Malik of any other participation than watching helplessly.

Malik claws at nothing and screams into the skies, cadging for his brother’s life, imploring for dregs of mercy. The satisfaction of revenge laughs in Malik’s face, the blood-sullied fury-contorted face smiles down on him while life seeps from his brother’s body. He is there to scourge punishment upon a child that maimed him, he is there to force him to watch Kadar’s last struggle, to parade Malik’s helplessness.

Malik screams with obstinate stamina, he implores, he begs, he curses as pear-shaped tears roll plump down his damp cheeks.

Nothing that is available to him will save Kadar’s life. He can watch, he can glare, but the earth won’t move. Climbing downhill to return to the temple, to run up the stairs and through the tunnel, to scale the theater—it is available, but he can’t race with death which stands a step away from the finish line and smirks back at him with a bloody, maimed face.

He is powerless, weak. He can’t protect the only thing that’s left to him.

There are gaps in his screams now.

Kadar’s frail little arm falls limp at his side, there is no movement, no resistance, the child dead. The warrior’s hands refuse to unclasp from his neck long after this and hands of grief thrust into Malik’s chest ripping and tearing what’s inside. He failed to protect. He lost all that held value. He weeps through a scream-tattered throat. Pain gurgles deep down in his chest choking each breath with the sting of loss. He failed to protect.

Strangled before his own eyes. Suffocated. Choked like an animal.

The beast rises above the dead body of his little brother, with blind, bleeding eye and bliss at the grief inflicted. Malik is curling up into a sit to await the body of his brother, but it’s not entrusted into his care. The man picks the corpse up, hoists it onto shoulder, sneers with a misshapen beam, takes off.

It’s difficult to isolate a single pain that hurts worse, it’s hard to tell what bears more damage, whether it’s his bruised body, his shredded chest, the theft of his brother’s corpse. He grows sober with the warrior’s disappearance. He watches in horror at the vacant spot.

He has escaped with Kadar’s body, and Malik hurts.

It is at this stage that Malik makes his decision—it comes on its own, he doesn’t make it—and heroism has laid itself to a grave and given rise to loyalty instead. He will follow this monster to afterlife to retrieve the dead body of his brother. He need not live after. He need live enough to give proper burial to his brother.

The descend downhill is strenuous, a laborious task for Malik’s sore, beaten body. He clambers down scraping whatever is left untarnished, wreaking deeper damage to what is already raw, he starves for speed, for the warrior is at the temple by now and he will lose sight of him if he hesitates at the possibility of injury. Pain for Kadar dilutes whatever pain this slide down the rocky steepness of the hill begets.

He dashes for the temple front, his legs are straining. When he skids to a halt, in that short moment of stillness, the ache in his abused body spreads through double-fold, his muscles throb with soreness, the flesh pulses with stabs of pain where cut, where torn.

Nothing awaits at the temple complex. Beyond, across the forum, there is a void.

He looks past, his wild gaze springs to the remaining option and he finds him, the one warrior-clad form striding down the main north-south street with a dead child slung over the shoulder. Malik starts after the figure keeping eyes on the corpse of his brother. He pursues, he doesn’t hide. It doesn’t occur to him to shield himself, not from the murderer, not from any other warrior.

The people thinned. The streets are emptying. Whole houses and villas are no more, fires reek across the city.

The air blows cold on his forehead while he tails after the murderer, there is that much he can do. To steal the body once he discards it. By the time the distance is crossed from start to end of the main street, Malik is not himself anymore. He walks a lost soul in someone else’s body, his grief wearing thin until it morphs into numbed pain and blind following after the stench of a murderer.

He vows.

He swears to make him drink blood and pain.

Malik is beaten but there is life in him yet. Had he made effort to fell his neck and drop gaze, he would have seen the drip of blood he follows. Had he tried to remove gaze from the bob of Kadar’s dead head, from the wayward sway of limp limbs, he would have known they have passed [Hiba](http://the-king-of-novices.tumblr.com/post/105028879746/live-forever-or-die-trying-the-pantheon-3-10)’s hill, they are passing through the grain fields between it and the volcano. Had he known anything but the dead, mechanical advancing of his own body, Malik would have seen the warriors that walk this same path, to this-or-that direction, or warriors combing the grain fields in search for survivors, he would have seen the looks locked onto his dragging, beaten form, he would have felt the yoke of their threatening, menacing looks. They don’t touch him. No one touches him as he trails half-dead after a dead body. A child is stalking a murderer towards his nest—he is left untouched to be swallowed whole in the trap he is wandering into on his own.

Kadar’s small corpse dangles from the shoulder bereft of spauldron, until the warrior shrugs the burden off, drops the child to dirt. Kadar’s body slumps into the dust that many boot-soles have trodden, Malik’s deadened mind works itself into accepting a possibility and he gambles with the notion of hope, he pines for the chance to steal the body under his nose. To bury his brother on [Hiba](http://the-king-of-novices.tumblr.com/post/105028879746/live-forever-or-die-trying-the-pantheon-3-10)’s hill, the grave of the god most dear to Kadar.

The warrior’s rotten mind doesn’t move to permitting hope.

He bends, takes the dead child’s ankle into a ruthless grip which is felt elsewhere, not on the body he is clutching but the one watching. He turns away and starts dragging the body with him across dirt.

Malik unbridles the cry that festered in throat at the sight, his grief surges in the first quick burst and dwindles to a woeful, mournful wail that follows them up the path. Malik’s face is wet, sodden, and it’s not easily remedied—he has nothing to wipe the tears, his hands, his wrist, his arms, are soaked by the time the path up starts to curve.

He wails. He follows. He pawns all strength that’s left in him to climb up the path after the monster dragging his brother’s corpse along the dirt and rock they pass, he clambers its flat, sloping, winding zig-zag up towards the top of the volcano.

The story goes that the stench of death once drew the god of death to this island.

The story goes that following [Hiba](http://the-king-of-novices.tumblr.com/post/105028879746/live-forever-or-die-trying-the-pantheon-3-10)’s untimely death, following the perishing of first warrior-humans, the children of Nokem, during the clash with Ga’ash’s evil spirits, the god of death arrived to soil tugged by the smell of death.

Malik draws up the path following the stench of death that once drew [Zikaron](http://the-king-of-novices.tumblr.com/post/119950551366/god-zikaron-patron-of-death-prophecies), and there, on top, beside the sea of warrior encampments that stretches vast across the flat summit of the volcano, it reeks of massacre, it reeks of treachery.

Abbas swerves around, to sneer at the brat while he realizes he has walked right into a snare, but there is none.

The child is gone.

Abbas’ one uninjured eye flits around rifling the nearest grounds in search for the imp that robbed him of sight, the slobbering creature that wailed after his speck of a brother all the way up to the apex. To the right are crates, boxed equipment for shipping, to the left is but the underbrush, a thicket of tawny, withering shrubs fading away in preparation for early winter, and not even a sough of noise to mark his whereabouts.

Gone. Hidden.

Abbas keeps the naked compression of palm against his gouged eye, keeps the other around the corpse’s ankle. He followed orders and he paid for it with grievous wound. Set out, spread out, kill them all. Bring their corpses back. Gather them on top.

The sniveling brat will turn up and meet his deserved end.

Abbas cushions the pain of injury with this spurt of vengeance and tears himself along tugging the corpse with him, letting it drag as he hauls himself to heap it on pile atop the others. He spots Altaïr at the outer lip of the mass grave that has been dug to accommodate all who will be slaughtered tonight. Altaïr is preparing the bodies to be thrown into the deep, unmarked pit. It wasn’t half as deep when Abbas set out into the city along the others.

Abbas borrows from silence and the dazzling flow of cussing he mutters under breath is unheeded or unheard by Altaïr.

He drags himself to one of the piles of bodies, variously tainted by death—some look unscathed, some bloody, some torn, gashed open—and he drops the child corpse beside the line of others, can’t even bring himself to slot it atop. Altaïr flicks the briefest moment of attention from the corner of his eye, not more, but he promptly stares at Abbas when the blinded warrior boots the corpse, kicking it.

“Abbas. Leave it be.”

Abbas doesn’t kick anymore but he glowers down at where Altaïr is crouching and shoving body after body down the slope of the pit, his face is a mash of repulsive fury and blood, the snarl that is contorting his mouth pops out an astonishing amount of pink upper-gum tissue.

Altaïr receives the expression with open arms and lets is run past him, that’s how extensive his care for Abbas’ grimace and unabashed disgrace is.

“I see you kill children now. A few years more and maybe you’ll learn how to kill a real man,” Altaïr monotones from his crouch watching the snarl pull Abbas’ mouth further back. Altaïr’s mockery does turn gloating into shameful admission of defeat, never voiced, as Abbas turns to report to the nearest medicus and have his wound treated.

Altaïr turns to the most recent corpse next.

It appears without visible injury, there is no blood. Winding around the small neck are patterns of abrasion but no more than that. Throttled to death. Altaïr sighs, a mere wisp of breath to avoid drawing the stench of blood around inside himself, and picks the child up to lower it into the pit.

He is taken aback by the strangled moan of protest that stumbles from the bush a distance away.

Altaïr narrows his gaze, combs around for the source, but he does not discover it, it shows itself on its own.

A child—Altaïr can’t give him more than ten years—stands at a safe distance shrouded by a cloak of withering thicket. A look of panic charges forth from his battered face, his eyes stare at the corpse in Altaïr’s arms, then up at him. The child’s eyes are large, round, dark.

“Give him to me.”

Were mice able to speak, their voice would possess more strength.

“I cannot,” the warrior retorts.

The child doesn’t settle for Altaïr’s answer. The child is big enough, it’s small. Big enough to bury a brother, small against the power of a warrior. It stands small at this distance looking to Altaïr downright lost, in tears, broken. A miscast expression on a child’s face which should be steeped in mirth and innocence.

“Give him to me,” he begs, again.

“I cannot.”

Altaïr’s heart is moved by the sight, but his head remains fixed. His hands are tied, removed from choice. Obedience governs his mind.

“Please give him to me...” The child croaks out through veils of tears.

Altaïr doesn’t say a word.

Altaïr lowers the child to ground-not-pit. He hoists his shovel. He is not as wrapped by pride as Abbas at harming a child, but he can’t go against orders. He may divert discipline at best and hope he will overlook his own transgression. He moves a handful of steps away from the mass pit, he looks at the child and away, to avoid the bated breath and small face pregnant with expectation.

The spade jabs the ground and scoops the first earth from soil.

Altaïr works fast. The more the interval between his erratic glancing over shoulder shortens, the paler he grows at the risk that is someone finding him digging a separate grave. His face is not sallow for long, it turns hot and red under the steam of strain he puts into digging with haste, hollowing the gritty soil into a new, smaller pit. He labors in a quick tumult, his muscles scream from overuse.

Twice he peeks aside to find the child crouching amid hoary leaves and dried stems with a trance-like staring at Altaïr’s impromptu pit, with scraped arms wound around bleeding knees. The child is receptive not dim-witted, not foolish. The knowledge of warriors swarming the expanse of the volcano top keeps him tied to whatever meager cover he has in the bushes. Death can creep up from any side, if he is sighted. He crouches there amid shrubbery with a subtle sway and deadened knees and drying, dirty face, and stares into the growing mound of earth, the only thread that keeps him alive is to see his brother into a proper grave. Altaïr knows the child had intended to steal the body from the heap. This is as good a grave anyone could get tonight.

The grave is deep enough, Altaïr was too painfully alert during digging lest his erratic surroundings inveigle him into a preposterous oversight of other spectators, but he sets himself straight and picks the dead child up, carries him to hollow ground, sinks into it with corpse in arms. He doesn’t do it so much for the dead as much for the living sibling. He lowers the body with borrowed carefulness, his first instance of attention of this kind he bestowed upon the traitors, he lays the child out and scrambles out of the grave. The burial is carried out with haste. He has nothing to shroud the child in before he entombs the body in this humble, shallow grave, and naked earth pours down in full shovels until the child is completely interred.

One year from now, the older child will return to this spot. Through a warrior’s errant act of kindness he will be able to tell apart the remains of his brother by means of a solitary tomb set apart from a mass grave. One year from now, Malik will steal up the volcano with Leonardo at his side, to shift Kadar’s remains to [Hiba](http://the-king-of-novices.tumblr.com/post/105028879746/live-forever-or-die-trying-the-pantheon-3-10)’s hill across the plunging valley between.

Altaïr leaves no mound.

He flattens the grave and levels it out that scarcely a sign can be picked, that no one would investigate. Whatever excess of earth remains he hurls into the sheer vastness of the mass grave where it falls amid the heap of bodies, too small an amount to hold notice.

He thinks this abrupt swerving from a linear course of duty will be the end of it. It’s bound to be. Altaïr has dug a grave to avert this case of brothers torn apart through death from haunting him for the rest of his life, to staunch the guilt it would have chiseled into his head. He expects the living sibling to scram from sight. To seek shelter and chase after survival. It is what any child would have done.

The child doesn’t flinch from spot.

The child stumbles out, topples, falls to ground, and his fit starts.

He smooths himself down the flattened grave, a mournful cry tears from throat. Altaïr stares, appalled, perplexed. With no prior chance given to grieve or suffer the pain of loss, the child scrapes, claws, tears at loosened earth with wet and choking sobs upsetting the drawn-out cry of lament.

Its jittery pitch stiffens the limbs Altaïr needs tonight. The sight of a child laid out across the grave of a sibling shelves whatever toughness he dressed himself in tonight. He stands a human, less a warrior.

As a human, he grieves along. As a warrior, he seeks escape. The scales of duty are heavier.

There is a scrap of a human in him as he retreats, for he knows the child won’t be alive tomorrow. Not unless he pursues escape. At present, conflicting as this behavior is with all Altaïr is familiar with, the child remains flattened to ground where earth can’t drink all cries that bleed from his mouth and this call of prey is invitation for any predator to kill.

The child sobs himself steadily for a moment of time, loses cognition of the world around, cannot remember anything but what he last remembers of his brother, he drinks from sorrow blindly and vomits grief, he can scarcely remember to piece himself together before the kind enemy in retreat, but Altaïr has already fallen from sight.

The surviving child sobs himself through the dregs of a long, desolate night with cold winds whizzing past him.

The child lies there till daylight.

 

* * *

 

Word passes round about a child.

He is neither dead nor gone by next morning and Altaïr finds him where he left him, with the distinct lack of mourning cries.

He lies flattened to the strip of land with limbs smelted into rigid immobility through the harsh winds that blew all night. He is not unnoticed, nor left to solitude. Warriors gather in clusters, between meals, between preparations for war, to hurl handfuls of dirt at the lying child and pelt him with insults at best and death threats at worst. Altaïr doesn’t know if they beat him, his welts and bruises are starting to show on broad daylight and it’s hard to discern whether they belong to horrors of last night or to recent daybreak.

The child doesn’t budge from mockery nor does it flinch from the promise of murder. He clings to the flat grave, his loyalty marches beyond the limits of death, he marches across the frontier of mortality with loyalty at his forefront.

Loyalty is a poor method of self-preservation.

 

* * *

 

The child’s second day on the grave is too similar to the previous one to be told apart.

Yesterday Desmond told him one story and today he told him two.

He relayed the child’s origin, his family. A wealthy family. One that lived across [Daga](http://the-king-of-novices.tumblr.com/post/105887755561/live-forever-or-die-trying-the-pantheon-4-10)’s bath complex. He imparted that the child’s family is entirely dead, killed in strenuous skirmish after having inflicted considerable injury to warrior ranks. He divulged a name. Malik, the child is called.

The Malik who spends night and day lying at the grave of his dead sibling, Malik who puts himself in constant danger and receives the foul dirt thrown and shouted at him, Malik who accepts this looping circle of vultures around a living cadaver as an inevitable cost of loyalty to family.

It is said that people discard what is different from them but don’t recognize the similar.

Altaïr doesn't grasp the essence of this child at first, understanding eludes him—he is deeply convinced, was deeply convinced, that a child’s instinct for bare survival would outshine any higher principles—it rankles him that this child, this Malik, has such meager awareness of mortality, but it dawns on him at last. He sees a mirror of himself laid out before his very eyes.

 

* * *

 

Ezio once joked that Altaïr is attracted solely to loyalty.

Loyalty it was that attracted Altaïr to his future husband. Loyalty to those long dead.

On the third day, the child is not merely lying across the grave. He is curled into himself with dreadful pains in a  belly unused to starvation. Altaïr is possessed of a not very sympathetic temperament. Yet his callous interior is raided by this display of devotion to family, his face softened by the impact of such blatant loyalty which refuses hunger for food. He feels a different kind of sympathy gnaw at his own filled belly. At a second glance, it were a few little, big things that amounted to his later grand decision.

They are awarded a bowl of warm milk a day as sweetener along the breakfast. The downside of this is that they have to drink it on spot. Altaïr knows this disadvantage before he allows his hopes to soar too high. He places bets on another kind of advantage which involves swapping this sweetener with another portion of other meals, such as a savory porridge on good days, and bread on bad ones. Altaïr has the misfortune of having stumbled not on his own bad day but the cook’s.

“Now that you’ve picked my bones clean, give me my ration,” he demands as the tepid bowl of milk is taken up from his hand.

In return for this sacrifice he receives two lumpy loaves of bread, equally tepid at least. He glowers and frowns and stares at the loaves in hands but they won’t multiply and he scrambles from the tent. There won’t be enough for both of them and his sour mood shrivels up at a snail’s pace and returns with a rush as he finds a warrior gloating over Malik’s tacit, soundless misery.

Altaïr shoulders him, thrusts him aside with a territorial sneer, and the man relents leaving him free reign over what he considers prey.

Malik’s sullen, sullied face is turned the other way, towards the bushes and sea ahead, his back and tattered, torn tunic facing the inward of the volcano top where the encampments are strewn across in an orderly manner.

He is curled up with a pained face and eyes shut and wrinkled around the corners where he’s pressing fervently under the pinpricks of pain. This vision is entrusted to Altaïr after he assumes a winding path around the grave, with silent step, to examine the little face harrowing with deep discomfort. He is a child bent to lie there until the last drop of grief evaporates form his body. Or until someone slits his throat.

He is shivering gooseflesh by night, refusing to budge from the dirty lump of earth. He doesn’t acknowledge his limits, his mind clasped tight around grieving, with a body that obeys unquestioningly.

The child has eaten nothing in two days.

Altaïr unbuckles the flask from his belt noiselessly, it’s flat and round, it’s clean—or at least the side he doesn’t lay to ground beside the child—and he arranges the two cooling loaves of plain bread atop so that they wouldn’t tumble from the flask onto ground.

Malik doesn’t unfurl, he wouldn’t budge for Al Mualim himself, but he squints up, he peers at Altaïr from the grave, there are signs on recognition in his dark eyes if not on his worn, deadened face.

A diet of dry bread and cold water.

That is what Altaïr can offer.

He offers peace, too. He stands away, to put the child at ease until his particular distance swindles him out of finicky stubbornness. When he has removed himself from Malik’s sight the protected loaves topple from flask and plummet to dirt. They are not discarded. They are put on hold while Malik empties the flask, quickly. He leaves it aside pretending it’s never been there. He collects the loaves from ground drawing both to his chest, as if to cherish before the first bite finds his whetted mouth.

Altaïr doesn’t stir to gather up his drained flask, not until long after the child gobbles up the humble meal.

Malik has understood—it was the only way he would accept this offering and no other besides—that Altaïr’s act was not a sign of charity, but admiration. The warrior sustains what he is fond of seeing, what he can’t lay eyes upon on common days. He feeds the child because he admires his constancy, his devoted fidelity to principles higher than life or hunger.

Altaïr likes to tell himself that what he did was a selfless gesture of kindness, though he knows, inwardly, in some far-away corner of chest, that the reach of his deed stretches to remote possibilities he is trying to open. He does it to extract in advance a favor he nurtures himself towards with unsteady but growing speed.

Altaïr knows that Malik’s loyalty to family will carry on long after their passing.

Altaïr craves loyalty like his body craves breath.

 

* * *

 

The child doesn't disappear next day.

He remains softened to the grave amid this focal point of warriors, the jeers and threats against him grow more violent. It's a matter of day, or hour, when someone will draw the blade, he is bound for death in this danger zone for survivors of the Massacre. A general amnesty is in order, issued and decreed by Al Mualim, more looked through than looked up to, not largely followed (because Al Mualim connives at transgressions of warriors) and therefore still convenient to break where survivors are present.

Malik is on the brink of death, on the very precipice, he awaits a brutish hand between shoulders to push him into the abyss, but his loyalty doesn't stray.

It’s not empathy that draws Altaïr to Malik.

Altaïr is a young man madly attracted to the notion of loyalty.

Malik is not a splendid self-preserver, but he does not live in a splendid world, and his loyalty is more than splendid. A grown flower in a squalid world and dismal light. Altaïr goes on with swallowing this rare sight until he grows drunk from it, until a different thought begins to dizzy through his head, a decision locked in the safety of his mind before it could venture out and bolt from its lodgings.

A solid decision has not been laid out at first try, it needed different manners of painting, polishing, and carpeting to craft itself into what he started to reach for in the end.

The alterations of his mind are touched whenever he lays eyes upon him, changed in different courses after every last time he sees him, until inaction feels nauseating. To leave such loyalty in the arms of death would be like striking the very blow against himself—a warrior, a man who used to maintain that no man or woman share scales with him, that no person could come close to the capacity for loyalty he was gifted with. Altaïr believes—he used to believe—that no one is as loyal as he is, a trait demonstrated by his devotion to Al Mualim’s cause and Desmond’s friendship who earned his trust since their early days at [Hiba](http://the-king-of-novices.tumblr.com/post/105028879746/live-forever-or-die-trying-the-pantheon-3-10)’s orphanage. He used to believe. Now different thoughts fill him until he is swollen up like a balloon with them and his tongue grows heavy, until it unravels before Al Mualim.

Altaïr’s obsession with loyalty and obedience is the unfortunate drive that guides him to Al Mualim. He ventures into asking permission to marry.

Like most men in the barracks, he is unmarried with no future to think of. There is one perfect difference that divides him fiercely from others. Instead of jumping day-to-day to fresh things that made life worth living, Altaïr had long settled on one. A loyal husband.

There is a myriad troubles Altaïr is faced with. He seeks to bind such loyal person to himself, but Malik is a mere child. Child marriage is unheard of, forbidden, a rare custom from far-off foreign lands, deeply condemned within the borders of this island. Altaïr’s next most grievous trouble is the matter of war. He is to be shipped off abroad as early as tomorrow, to evade home for a time unknown—one, two, three years, perhaps longer.

Altaïr plies his arguments before Al Mualim with the cunning of goddess [Masekha](http://the-king-of-novices.tumblr.com/post/106253964456/live-forever-or-die-trying-the-pantheon-5-10), he knows what will appeal to his master at present. Voicing public consent to Altaïr’s marriage is less a matter of child marriage and more a matter of mercy, of upping his public image as a merciful and compassionate leader. The gesture of good will towards the handful survivors leaves a good image with the common folk. When the answers to both of Altaïr’s problems meld into one single solution in form of Al Mualim’s permission—his special dispensation for Altaïr’s marriage—the remaining task is to persuade Malik into a marriage.

The issue remains a matter of _how_ , not a matter of _if_.

Altaïr is presented with probably the most intricate of his matters, which is coaxing a child into a marriage. He shuns the prospect of putting himself into Malik’s role though the notion is tempting, he sees too many similarities between them to allow himself ease into this horrid position. He wants to tie to himself what is similar to him. He craves to secure the child for himself so it’s him who lays hands on his loyalty first, so that no one steals it away while he is gone from the city. He won’t allow blatant theft of the child that holds the same strength of character as Altaïr himself, the same traits, the same capacity to remain loyal under the dire weight of death, the child of tender age that doesn't put its own instinct of survival above loyalty.

With blessings bestowed, Altaïr guides himself towards the grave he dug, and he is surer than ever that he needs to be the first to put a leash on that loyalty before it’s snatched by death, or worse, by someone else’s hand.

 

* * *

 

Altaïr finds him worse than before.

Tired, jaded, burned out.

A dog perishing with loyalty. To seize that loyalty, to claim it, to see it bloom under his care, under no light but his own. This ambition steers him when he approaches the child prone across the small grave. Altaïr skirts around, toys briefly with his way of approach, fiddles with several possible tactics.

Altaïr’s new offering doesn’t surpass the modesty of the last one by much. It’s the same flask with fresh water, two loaves of bread, cold, but with a dot of butter spread between split halves. When Altaïr takes a place beside Malik, it’s not on the strip of land Malik alone lays claim on, not on the grave he dug. He sits down cross-legged one step aside, closer to the shrubbery. Malik opens his eyes and peers at him forlornly, like the last time. Altaïr knows not if it’s the glint of recognition in his dark eyes or the expectation that widens the seams of his swollen, drowsy eyelids is a result of a presence or _Altaïr’s_ presence. Whatever confidence he eased himself into might as well be a faux mirror of his own hopes, not the child’s response to his kindness.

Malik rubs his eyes and nose thoroughly with the back of his hand, he lifts himself, on elbow, then sits up carefully.

Altaïr’s food is intended for Malik. He won’t relinquish hold on it until the child attempts to solicit the food from him, but he makes no attempt to consume it.

When Malik doesn’t speak his body does. He glowers at Altaïr’s face, refuses to drop gaze down to the warrior’s lap to give the man the satisfaction of seeing him stare out at the food, but nothing muffles the noisy growl of the child’s empty stomach. Malik’s small face pieces itself into the closest to mortification Altaïr has seen on him until now, and for this alone he doesn’t allow his mouth movement, he doesn’t pull it up into wanted smile.

“You must be mad with hunger to speak from your belly,” Altaïr says, an elaborate earnestness on his face.

Altaïr does what he did last time. He lays the flask flat across the ground, at his right side, and slots the two buttery loaves on this cleaner side of his flask.

“Take it.”

Malik edges forward.

He doesn’t even dignify the warrior with a look. For stubbornness or humiliation, or both, it’s vague. His teeth tear into the bread chopping off hungry, greedy chunks of it, Altaïr watches from the corner of his vision, mulls over the debris of past thoughts looking for a fitting way to lay everything open. Malik feeds on the second loaf with less haste, he breaks the round loaf at seams to regard the buttery innards, as if wondering how it found its way inside, who put it there. He appreciates the addition, he doesn’t inquire about this generosity.

The child is old enough to take charity with dignity but innocent enough to believe in kindness.

While Malik is emptying the flask of water, Altaïr feeds his own expectations, of what sort of outcomes may await after this conversation, he waits until the moment of quality arises.

It’s a bleak day today, not a trace of [Hiba](http://the-king-of-novices.tumblr.com/post/105028879746/live-forever-or-die-trying-the-pantheon-3-10)’s eye on the horizon. Altaïr’s last day before departure.

“We go to war. Tomorrow.”

Malik nudges the flask back to him, and says nothing. Altaïr feels the narrow neck of the flask dig through the leathery feathers of his warrior skirt and receives no answer, not even a hint.

“Your name?”

“Yours?” The child counters. The warrior smirks, with the side of mouth the child can’t see. Malik’s name is not unknown to him.

“Altaïr.”

“Malik,” the child offers promptly.

A silence stretches on without much variation, and then:

“Do you wish to live, Malik?” The warrior makes an innocent advance on him, to help him conquer his shame. Malik will accept his marriage proposal, he thinks of no other alternative. Altaïr is mellow and subtle, to soften the impact of acceptance Malik can’t refuse.

“I welcome death,” the child says. No whispers, no fear. “I can’t forgive myself the mistakes I can’t erase.”

He recites, like from some open book. The child is owner of a rare degree of shrewdness. Rarer still is his profound sense of loyalty.

Altaïr is awed, he admires what he is endeavoring to capture, to ensnare into his own trap. But time is slipping through his fingers like sand and his frustration swells, he has little appetite to harangue a child about mortality.

Altaïr enlightens him about the special dispensation he received from Al Mualim. He doesn’t detail but he lays it all out as succinctly as doable, he asks for Malik’s nod to the marriage hoping to cajole him into consent. He receives a singular answer.

“No.”

There is some briskness, some arrogance and vanity, and some self-esteem in the crisp answer to Altaïr’s prior account of affairs. It’s an odd blend that mixes well with the child’s dogged stubbornness.

“Look, child,” Altaïr starts patronizingly, “I can’t give you what you lost, but I can give you life. An escape from imminent death. A shelter, a bed, safety. You’d be removed from [Zikaron](http://the-king-of-novices.tumblr.com/post/119950551366/god-zikaron-patron-of-death-prophecies)’s embrace—“

“Help yourself to [Daga](http://the-king-of-novices.tumblr.com/post/105887755561/live-forever-or-die-trying-the-pantheon-4-10)’s path,” Malik spits harshly.

 _Help yourself to the nearest cliff_. _Throw yourself off it_. _Kill yourself_.

With that defiant proclamation, Malik returns to sulk. He stares off across the shrubbery and far beyond onto the calm line of the sea, as if he didn’t just insult the one warrior that fed him bread and esteem.

What Altaïr was hoping is that he would change his mind, and the warrior opts for emotional blackmail as the next best solution now that this appeal to self-interest has failed. The silence that follows, however, is continuous, unbroken and deafening. Altaïr has thrown up a good chance for nothing.

The warrior is recognizing that what he is about to do is going too far.

Malik’s blend of stubbornness and noble manners make him very hard to deal with. Altaïr is simply not equal against a child who lost everything to be able to rip this last price of dignity from him. Malik is not afraid to follow his family to death and devoted loyalty to them takes precedence over life, he is not afraid. Only he is. Perhaps he is not. He might be. Altaïr decides to test it.

He unsheathes his knife sans noise. He grips the handle in the hand removed from the child’s field of vision.

Altaïr needs patience, or there won’t be progress towards opening, but he cleans out the possibility of waiting—it wasn’t available to him. Altaïr is hurry and bad temper. He is getting hungrier and hungrier for immediate results. Only a miracle can pry him open. Malik’s remark seems to have been generated spontaneously, a squeak released at the tight gripping of loyalty around his neck.

Altaïr mirrors the grip, on the handle of his knife, he waits for a favorable moment to strike, waits until but a smoke is left from Malik’s earlier fire of pride.

The first shove sends Malik tumbling sideways, the pounce stabs him into crying out, the blade digging into tensed tendon of his neck casts him into a panicked glancing up.

The warrior hovers above him like death, with knife pressed to his throat with furious rushing into folly and eyes molded into menace, and fear swallows Malik’s limbs into a rigid stillness. A look of dread passes over his face before he can even think to resist—he can’t call for aid, he can only struggle-kick- _fight_ —but Altaïr removes the knife leaving only a raised welt where the line of blade was pressed, he doesn’t retreat.

Altaïr seizes him by either arm and holds him down and Malik doesn’t feel equal to a warrior, he watches as the looming anger, the sham of it, disappears from the warrior’s face without notice.

“I sought to spare you further humiliation and death,” Altaïr whispers.

Altaïr’s faked attack reveals itself for what it was. A heinous act he was content to obscure behind simulation at the promise of its aid in obtaining Malik’s favor. A threat, a reminder of mortality to show him that he will want life when faced with death, to stoke the spark of craving life during this violent act and bring the lesson across. He must tie Malik to consent now or see him dead by tomorrow. Malik’s face scrunches up in sheer anger, and some betrayal, but he sees the stratagem behind the warrior’s faked assault, his anger turns pale and face doleful, his limbs go limp. The humiliation of having revealed to Altaïr under duress that he wants to live suffuses his cheeks with a healthy glow.

Altaïr seizes it as near-consent, a gate opened.

“You would save your life through marriage,” Altaïr reiterates.

“A caged bird. A bought freedom.”

“Better a wingless bird than a dead fowl.”

The child listens. The child thinks.

He may not be as wingless even if his vision is obstructed by bars. His vision doesn’t stretch beyond blood. That’s what he tells himself (even after admitting fear of death). He need only retain command over his sharpened beak and talons, just enough gap between gilded bars to tear into the flesh of the enemy once time is ripe. That’s all he needs. That’s what Altaïr needs not know.

He collapses under Altaïr’s demand without even opening to him.

He proves himself softer than the warrior had divined.

Malik utters a _yes_ before he thinks ahead to what awaits him. If he wants to even the scales of justice, he will have to live. If he wants to live, he will need a shelter, food, and roof over his head. If he wants a shelter he must marry. He yet wants to keep his life, he yet wants vengeance, and who knows if Altaïr will return alive from the war. If he doesn’t, all is good. If he does, then Malik can exact his revenge better, because he might edge closer to the murderers of his brother through Altaïr’s presence.

The warrior lifts himself pulling the child to feet.

For an instant he is so perfectly and wildly happy that even the profound deadness of Malik’s face almost seems worth it. He will swipe it from the child’s face. He will shake the stupor of mourning from his chest. The child will grow into an affectionate, loyal husband.

All will be well.

 

* * *

 

There is a ceaseless, nagging chorus of disagreement among the priests while Malik is wed to Altaïr.

It has been there ever since the child issued a demand-or-plea for one of the dark, billowy cloaks donned by priests. Once given to him devoid protest and rich with wonder, Malik sheets what is intended for shoulders right across his head, he winds the cloak round his head like a dark hood, he lets the rest hang down his shoulders and back, and were he any older the residual length of the cloak would not be touching the floor as it does now. Dark— _dark_ as Nokem he stands in [Gdila](http://the-king-of-novices.tumblr.com/post/104486350666/live-forever-or-die-trying-the-pantheon-2-10)’s temple. Nokem’s colors are not meant for marriage.

He stands as wounded Nokem, a makeshift robe to show his independence, his family origins. A revenge he found to seal up the words he won’t speak today. To signify that no one could treat him like a dog. A prideful child.

The strict order orchestrated by Al Mualim was bound to produce some grumbling and no meager amount of tacit dissent among the priests present at the temple. They obey this wayward, unorthodox command, with unconcealed revulsion speaking from their faces where their tongues are tied by instruction.

The ceremony is the oddest affair that the temple ever beheld—to call it a ceremony would be stretching it far too generously. In the unsightly truth of it, it is clear that the warrior and the child are merely there to voice their consent, to be wedded by a priest, to be subsequently released as if nothing happened.

The priest is a priestess.

A woman with red cheeks like the cheeks of an apple, a motherly, interfering kind of woman. She shoulders the scandal away, the many scandals of this marriage—Malik’s age, Malik’s rejection of customs and donning of [Nokem](http://the-king-of-novices.tumblr.com/post/104486337526/live-forever-or-die-trying-the-pantheon-1-10)’s colors, the swiftness of this matrimony, the special dispensation. The order stands and they are to wed a child to a man.

There is more to Malik’s blatant disrespect for the colors of matrimony. The dressing of improvised hood-and-robe is defying reason and flouting before death. It’s a daring risk in the living aftermaths of the Massacre that swept half of the city. It is an outcry of pride at his origins, blood, ancestry, a shout of loyalty to those beneath ground. It is the child’s only way to rebel his marriage. It is his sole means to hide face from the man that is to become his husband.

Altaïr’s can catch but the barest tip of his nose through this or that brisk glimpse sideways, and nothing beyond. He must read the child through touch.

Malik splays his hand atop Altaïr’s when the priestess guides him there, she ties their wrists together and falls into the monotone drone of a prayer. Malik’s hand is trembling so hard that Altaïr has to widen the gap between his own splayed fingers and allow gravity to perform the rest. The tips of Malik’s fingers slip through widened break unwittingly, they fall through cracks and into Altaïr’s clasp. His fist shrinks the gaps, tightens around Malik’s knuckles, arrests his shiver, and holds.

When prompted, Altaïr speaks his _yes_. When prompted, Malik holds silence while Altaïr holds his hand.

Had Altaïr been able to budge, he would have glanced to the side to stare. Had Altaïr’s sympathy been of less strength, he might have pulled the hood off the child’s stubborn head to search his face. At present, all eludes him. The blush that embraces Malik on both cheeks, the face of a child that turns the color of a beetroot, the child that looks ready to burst into tears. To be cheated of innocence through marriage is torture to him.

A moment more and Malik would have confessed everything, Nokem knows it might have happened, but he keeps it imprisoned in his head, he parts mouth to utter the word he is in debt to speak, he offers a whisper of _yes_ as payment.

The priestess joins them in matrimony before Malik can lose his head.

Altaïr’s trepidation is not allayed but his fear is. He is a husband now, he fears not. Malik’s heart is going to yield, it’s going to open. He is young and pliable. Time will heal his wounds.

 

* * *

 

The first signs of Malik’s fatigue start to show after they leave the temple behind their backs. Altaïr had pinpointed the location of his home and the very implication of climbing a hill seems to have imbued Malik with exhaustion. His step is tired and wobbly, he trails after Altaïr in tattered clothing.

He is unsteady on his feet, not having eaten proper meal for days, having skewed sleep, having suffered on cold, naked soil, and Altaïr wouldn’t bet all his money on Malik holding out long enough to not collapse on his way up. His decision comes quick—it’s born of common sense.

Altaïr hoists the child up like nothing heavier than a pillow.

Malik wastes himself on some moments of haggling with his own determination, considers whether to resist or not, but finds no strength left in him. He shirks humiliation, dismisses whatever remains of embarrassment are in him; he is but a child.

When he coils his arms round Altaïr’s neck, he shrugs himself closer into the man’s hold and allows the gap between his own arm and Altaïr’s shoulder to be the cushion for his chin.

The warrior is warm as if he has been drinking sun.

He holds still and Altaïr whisks him off to his new home.

 

* * *

 

He had drifted off in the warrior’s arms and Altaïr’s quickened gusts of breath are what pulls Malik to awareness. They are climbing up hill. His weight in Altaïr’s arms has long turned into a burden and the man strains with him in arms but his mind doesn’t move to letting him down and Malik keeps his chin low and watches down the descend of the narrow path they are scaling. They climb the hill which was once a mound of earth where [Nokem](http://the-king-of-novices.tumblr.com/post/104486337526/live-forever-or-die-trying-the-pantheon-1-10) and [Gdila](http://the-king-of-novices.tumblr.com/post/104486350666/live-forever-or-die-trying-the-pantheon-2-10) buried their love-seed, the hill that is the cradle of life to the second wave of humans.

Aside, to his left, Malik catches a brief glimpse of a statue of [Nokem](http://the-king-of-novices.tumblr.com/post/104486337526/live-forever-or-die-trying-the-pantheon-1-10) hidden away inside a street niche, his heart flutters, drums on inside his rib-cage throughout the entire length of darkness as they pass through a tunnel.

Altaïr is so very swift in moving them up the stairs, up tunnel stairs and onto the second story that Malik catches only a cursory glance of the community courtyard, nothing beyond the water-well and the behemoth tree with a thick trunk and a thin web of naked twigs against the darkening sky above.

Altaïr lowers him to ground when they step inside.

His feet hurt and his muscles are sore, it feels like teaching himself to walk all over again. His chest feels icy with the man’s warmth removed from it.

It’s cold inside his new home.

Altaïr stalks the shift of expressions on the child’s face intently, he suspects a noble would frown upon his lodgings.

It was not long ago that Altaïr amassed on enough coin to purchase his home. The sum amounted to almost all money he’s been collecting for years, from his last days in the orphanage to the couple years in warrior ranks. All of it meticulously put aside for buying a home of his predilection, for getting himself a home on the spot he yearned for since his early years.

Little money remained, then, after this purchase, to give his attained lodgings the look of a true home. Yet Altaïr is proud of what little he has in his newly-acquired home. The location is as he had wanted it; the inside is humble.

The child’s gaze loafs about the dismal home, across the cold floor Altaïr has had no time to sweep, the austere desolation of his rooms bereft of furniture save for a few insignificant pieces strewn at random.

A dun and bare home.

To a child from a noble home of many luxuries, Altaïr’s home is suitable for nothing more than a pigsty. A dustbin would be crammed full by a moment of sweeping—that’s how littered with dust the floor is. The hearth is grimy, ashy, it smells of old and wet wood. For firing he has nothing but a handful of twigs, the hearth is without an oven, and the child will have to procure food from bakeries. When they re-open. If they re-open.

There is no larder. No stored food.

The warrior is comically short of cutlery. The kitchen is bare save for a handful of pots and pans that need brushing and a large knife, and no crockery. The only pitcher lies there on the bare ground, raided by dust. A small pile of plates, stuck together in their grease. The cups that exist are kept on a high (and only) shelf far out of the child’s reach.

The sole room that could bear resemblance to a home is the bedroom, deemed so for the old bed pushed against a wall farthest away from the only window in the room. The floor beneath Malik’s sandals is a creaky fusion of sounds, but the weathered wood is less cold than the dusty concrete of other rooms. There is a bed at least and bare necessities, some of them.

Malik reacts to his new home as blandly as Altaïr had expected of him.

The child throws a dull look around the barren home before the expression morphs into a distaste, a revulsion, a subtle curl of upper lip that doesn’t escape Altaïr’s notice.

Altaïr is proud of his home, shabby and poor as it is. Proud of having not inherited it but worked for every coin that went into the purchase. He tolerates the child’s fiery look of aversion because Malik at the very least isn’t deadened into his former mourning bleakness. Insulting as it is, at least it’s not as lifeless, not as dead as when his eyes were on the grave, and Altaïr is glad to see the last of _that_ dismal expression.

“I’m not one of your nobles,” Altaïr defends the poor state of his home to ward off indignity, to underscore pride in hard-earned house.

A silence grows around the child.

Malik finds the warrior passionately proud. Proud and lazy men do not make good husbands.

His struggle to accept the new surroundings is unusually painful, the gap between the abyss of death and unexpected marriage is difficult to bridge, it’s landing from one chasm into another, both equally steep, and his landing is not softened by what surrounds him here.

There is no hot water laid on.

Water is needed to wash Malik up and Altaïr won’t allow him to cleanse in a cold bath. Altaïr then walks straight out without waiting to be asked about his whereabouts. When he returns, he finds Malik forlorn and sitting on the edge of the bed; he orders him up.

Altaïr paid good for a bowl of lukewarm goat milk, he paid double for a small square of cornbread—the spoon he got for free.

Altaïr is a newcomer to this community, the people don’t yet trust him, and the Massacre has put them ill at ease and made them restless. From the nearest neighbor who would open the door for him Altaïr bought what they had at hand, and they had milk to offer for a child. Altaïr paid for the goat milk which he reckoned will be easier to digest for Malik, he swilled the lukewarm milk around in the bowl mixing it with softening crumbs of crushed cornbread.

Malik doesn't hide his hunger and pours the bowl of this warm pap down his neck before Altaïr can even set up a bath.

He has a wooden tub; he has a sponge at least. Hot water he has to collect from the boiling-room down on the first floor with a small bucket, and Malik counts eleven. Six are scalding, three lukewarm, two cold. Eleven visits to the boiling-room before Altaïr can fill up his tub at last. The soap is soft and falling apart, but the sponge is there to scrape off the filth where soap fails to do so.

Altaïr is tugging the tub closer, picking the empty bowl away from the child’s hands, ordering Malik to shed clothes, procuring towels—one to step out on, one to wrap him in. He is piling one job on another, not through incompetence, but to compensate with care what he couldn’t offer in material wealth. He is in arrears with offering what Malik used to have in home, but he prides himself on being a dutiful, devoted husband. He gives what he expects in return.

The child doesn’t take the orders well. He’d rather stow his dignity in under his tattered, dirt-smeared clothes and make off right to bed without a wash.

When two equally hot-headed tempers ultimately are on brink of breaking loose, Malik obeys and peels the tunic off first and the breeches next. Altaïr folds all up into a disorderly bundle for throwing out—all except the sandals. Altaïr unsheathes the knife that was pressed to Malik’s neck earlier to carve the dirt beneath nails of the child’s fingers with the tip of the blade while the child soaks in the tub of warm water. Once the disarrayed clutter of encrusted blood and caked dirt dissolves for scrubbing, Altaïr thoroughly inspects him for injury, now that the extent of the damage is starting to reveal itself. Aside from the bluish splotch below one eye where Abbas had hit him, there are discolorations along his ribs, and spots of variously-colored bruises scattered across limbs. There are welts and gashes, lacerations and cuts, skin scraped and chafed off, and dirt. So much dirt.

When Altaïr lathers the sponge up to clean the worst of it, Malik childishly protests his engagement in this cleanup, Altaïr doesn’t relent, they lose tempers again. When it dawns on Malik that he won’t hinder Altaïr’s efforts through mere complaints, he refuses to cooperate entirely. He sits limp in the tub barely budging to lift his limbs when Altaïr requires them up for scrubbing. He sits there soaking in the warm tub, he doesn’t wear himself out by working along but keeps stealing from Altaïr’s abnormal patience. He steadily refuses to help him work but he feeds the man’s patience only occasionally by not protesting being prodded and shifted around the tub, he hands him this glass of silence as courteously as he can—though not without an obligatory dark frown—as if silence in the face of this energetic washing up is reward enough for the warrior.

When Altaïr lifts him into standing he has nothing to dry his hands with at first and wipes them on his bare chest. It’s a comical image, one Malik would have giggled at, were it not for the cloak of mourning wrapped around his shivering form. He has to endure the shiver while Altaïr washes his hair with the last, twelfth bucket of water, he bends over keeping himself steady on each side of the tub while the warrior rubs-and-scrubs across his skull.

A plume of blood trickles from reopened cuts and down his limbs. Malik’s added pain doesn’t slow the warrior down.

At least the bathing towel is soft when he dries him at last. His shiver drops in violence but returns when Altaïr unwraps the bath towel once Malik gets to sit on the bed, to minister to his damage. More than an hour passes in treating his many injuries, in wrapping the deeper cuts, in applying salve on lacerations that haven’t been treated for days.

Altaïr instructs him to allow the salve dry before wrapping himself up in the blanket laid out beneath the bed cover—he has no more towels to wrap him in, he has no clean clothes that would fit him. He leaves him one of his own tunics to slip on during his absence.

Altaïr then leaves the child alone in the desolation of a cold, filthy home.

He has to leave home in hunt of supplies.

After the purchase of his home, Altaïr has found himself light of coin. A circumstance profoundly felt now when he wishes he had more money to leave more necessities to the child. A newly-acquired home, a newly-acquired husband, no coin. That is Altaïr’s affairs collected into one line. With the addition of a war that awaits him with first morrow light.

He is absolutely at the end of his money.

He goes to borrow a kesef from Ezio with the promise of quick return without explaining his purpose. He can’t ask for more, he knows Ezio's family is rich, but that family has been cut in half during the Massacre with his sister and mother remaining, and he hasn’t known Ezio as long as Desmond who he knows isn’t possessed of much money either. Desmond would give him what he has but Altaïr doesn't want to take from Desmond's equally hard-earned money. Another portion of coin he receives from redeeming his old clothes he may not need after return from war.

Half of the money he spends on clothes for Malik, one quarter he spends on necessities like soap and medicine, the last quarter he spends on their dinner and bread for the child. Some of the coin goes for bread, most goes for commissioning a neighbor to bake bread for Malik until the child can take care of itself, until Altaïr can send him first money from abroad.

People fear Altaïr’s presence, his very appearance. He should have left home in citizen clothes but the order issued by Al Mualim has been to not part from the armor outside of barracks or homes, and the order still stands. It’s an obstacle to an already difficult search for supplies, even with the lack of money excluded from the whole trouble. There is but a handful of people to buy from in a city where life has been brought to a standstill, where no people wander the streets in the aftermath of the Massacre, and no shops show signs of re-opening.

Altaïr returns to a breathing bundle of child wrapped inside both the blanket and the bed cover, sitting perched atop the bed like a guard dog.

On the bed Malik has his first hot meal in days.

Altaïr has no lamps. He has three candles in his bedroom, and Malik claims that three are unlucky, so they have only two. By the time Altaïr lays the bowls of warm stew and a plate of cheese and bread out, the child’s stomach is already clamoring for dinner. There’s no seat except for the bed and Altaïr refuses to eat on it, so he sits on the floor. Seeing this, Malik forfeits the bed as well to grudgingly slither down to ground, with a hint of a frown that joins his brow and lip into a dark scowl as a silent protest, but Altaïr orders him back up on bed. The meal goes comparatively easy and no one loses their temper.

Malik is slow and deliberate in chewing and selecting his food. He eats all, but in a peculiar order and arrangement. Altaïr has expected him to wolf it down as he himself had done, and now he sits on floor peeling one orange he had acquired along the way and examines Malik’s curious eating pattern. It might be some artistic nature or some inherent, intrinsic drive for categorizing food in a certain manner, Altaïr can’t label it as a learned behavior, but whatever the case there is a child making order inside a bowl of disorderly stew moving the ingredients around and arranging small bites in a desired manner, measuring each spoon with certain amount of meat, certain amount of vegetable, certain amount of cheese he keeps picking up from the plate. Altaïr doesn’t intervene with a comment, but he inspects the behavior.

Altaïr finishes skinning the orange in time with Malik’s finishing the meal. He rips it in half but gives both halves to the child.

Malik asks for tea but Altaïr has none.

The scent of citrus and melting wax wafts around the silence before Altaïr breaks it.

“I know this marriage was unwanted. Your sacrifice is acknowledged, it was a necessity to preserve life...” Altaïr makes pause. His tone is soft, his expectations humble. He doesn’t ask for more than he himself is willing to offer. “I saved your life. I gave you shelter and food. All coin that I have. Half my war pay will land in your hands by each month. I won’t seek any bed partner during my absence. In return, I expect only your loyalty,” Altaïr makes no stop until he has listed all his points and demands.

The child’s bruised face is engulfed by darkness at the edges, his eyes downcast and avoiding the glow of candle. He gives a nod, and when this gesture isn’t enough for Altaïr, he speaks his first words after an extensive silence.

“I give my word. I promise.”

Altaïr is appeased. The oath of loyalty discharged, sealed.

He wishes he could entrust more unto Malik, but he only has so much of possessions and money. Whatever has remained from his earlier purchase he leaves to the child. He will leave for war tomorrow without a single coin on him.

The half of whatever he earns abroad he will send to his husband, so that the child can keep itself afloat until his return. Altaïr is young enough. He will amass on more money during and after war to make his home look like a proper home, and as comfortable as he had once imagined to have it.

At present, he can’t give him more than he has, but he can give him a night of peace. He promises to leave the bed to Malik alone.

There is no time to attempt rubbing the grease off bowls and plate properly, no time to sweep the floor, so he lets it lie. He doesn’t shave but he washes his face, he rushes through packing his equipment and the few poor belongings he can carry with him to battle. He collects all remaining coins into a wad of cloth and ties it up, leaves it beside the bed for the child. By the time he’s gotten ready for the morning, the child has already flopped down on bed and conked out the moment he had put his head to pillow and wrapped himself into a cocoon of blanket and bed cover.

Altaïr makes his own bedding hastily, with incredible shoddiness.

His quantity of linen doesn’t exceed the needs of one usual unmarried man. He possesses two—one set for washing while the other is being used. While Malik sleeps in Altaïr’s set of clean linen, Altaïr has to make due with what he has. Once necessity starts to press, once he is forced into washing both sets of linen, Malik will be safe at the water-well in the community courtyard—the citizens took no part in the slaughter of nobles and no harm should come upon him down there.

Altaïr lays the washed set of bed linen across the floor right beside the bed, but it’s not enough to soften the ground and he turns to other alternatives. He finds another mismatched set—disused warrior blankets, smelling incorrigibly of sweat—and stuffs a piece that was intended as tablecloth and a bundle of his own clothes into a makeshift pillow.

The child rolls away onto his other side, away from the edge of bed Altaïr decided to sleep beside, and Altaïr shifts around on the floor until he’s found the softest way to angle his body on the unyielding ground barely softened by folded sheets.

It hardly matters, for he could sleep on cobblestones at present.

Altaïr is worn with fatigue from hauling heavy equipment onto ships, one of which he will board in a few hours, to be shipped off away from home and far abroad into the first battle. He attempts to deliver himself into the hands of much-deserved sleep. But sleep won’t come. His mind is brimming with thoughts of battle. And worry for the child sleeping above.

The first sound that steals down the edge of the bed and creeps into Altaïr’s ears is just when his body is starting to ease itself into sleep.

Altaïr blinks, alert.

One flinch upon the other, a shift, a reckless twitching in mid-sleep. The child is suffering nightmares and the warrior listens to it from the floor. The loop of violent twitching ceases with a sudden puff of breath. The child drinks from cold air, awake. Altaïr listens intently, and there is a sniff up on bed where there must be a flood of tears. There is no sobbing. The hush of the child’s whimpering voice pains him, tired as he is. He is unsure what to do, if he should do anything at all—he doesn’t excel at comfort—and ultimately he allows the child the peace of lone mourning.

Altaïr is preparing to close his eyes and ears to the whimpers but there is movement across the mattress above.

There is a hint of another move, a shifting across mattress, not of a body but of a smaller limb. A little arm then slips from the mattress down to where Altaïr lies awake. It’s not dropped, not offered either. It’s a silent plea. Malik doesn’t intend to ask for comfort, doesn’t venture into requesting Altaïr to climb up onto the bed to hold him. But he hangs his little arm down the side of the bed, down to where he thinks Altaïr is sleeping on floor. It dangles there in quietude, in hope. He doesn’t even know if the warrior is awake.

His bruised hand is small, frail.

It’s cold and Altaïr thrusts his arm away from the protection of his warm cover and squares his elbow up and wraps himself around the small dangling hand. He can almost entirely envelop it into his larger one. The child’s hand is cold and bruised, and the warrior swaddles it into a nest of warmth and protection. The bitty fingers clutch at the side of the warrior's palm and his small finger, until the violence of this clench wears itself out and morphs into a gentle holding of hands. No word is shared between them.

There is some light of hope for them, even if it’s hidden behind upwelling darkness.

Dawn creeps over the horizon while the ships are being prepared to carry them off into the throes of the first battle. The child eases into the beginnings of sleep and Altaïr listens to the cadence of his deep, calm breathing. It is quiet then, a great advantage. Altaïr can and must give himself rest. He is to rise in a couple of hours. He lies on hard floor holding onto the small hand that hangs from the bed while the child slowly drifts off. If Altaïr shifted the tip of his thumb he could count fresh and old welts atop Malik’s hand. Instead, he lies still keeping Malik in the warmth of his protection and holding all night onto the small hand shielded inside his.

He watches him sleep.

 


	6. Chapter 6

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> If you haven't seen some of the newest beautiful illustrations for this story, I kindly urge you to check out the latest additions on [the masterpost](http://the-king-of-novices.tumblr.com/post/108753402976/live-forever-or-die-trying-masterpost) (under 'all fanart').
> 
> I will include a couple of images during the chapter to give you a visual sense of surroundings/objects.
> 
> You know how long my chapters are and how much time I take to write them. With that in mind, I hope you’ll consume this slowly because I can’t produce new chapters as quick as I’d like to, or as quick as people can read them. I think it’s fair to mention that the reason it took me a long time to finish this chapter (other than the length) was because I gave up on the story for a period of two weeks or so. I picked it up again, but I’m fighting hard and the battles are slow, so my updates are slow accordingly. If you’re still reading this, you have my thanks. Gratitude to all participating in this story in their own ways.  
>    
>  **Disturbing imagery in some parts of this chapter. Beware.**  
> 

 

It’s deep into the morning when Altaïr’s hand gives the first twitch.

Malik is too awake to be alarmed by this miniscule movement. He feels obliged to glance up to peruse the warrior’s face. On it, there’s no trace of nightmares. Malik considers the serenity of his face for but a moment longer, then resumes watching over the warrior’s hands. Malik’s touch has waned with first morning light, but his fingers continue to clamor for it.

His attempts to touch Altaïr misfired at the outset, during the night, yet once the warrior’s mind was lulled into sleep Malik’s body started to shift absent his will. Perhaps it’s the opposite. Perhaps his body can be moved only through sheer will to touch. Malik only partially regrets never allowing Altaïr to see the gentleness of his nightly caress. He did find himself helplessly wondering whether Altaïr is aware that he had been touched, before and now. The possibility seems meager. The man has been arrested by sound sleep undisturbed by any movement other than a single one, shortly after he dozed off, in the one single instance when he drew Malik’s hand closer to himself in sleep, a movement appended by another shortly thereafter.

Malik had followed after that shift drawing nearer across the mattress.

Here, with the gap between them shortened, Malik enjoys the privilege of stealing warmth and listening in first-hand to the calmness of Altaïr’s breathing. It’s evenly-paced, soft. Soft, so unlike his hands. They are hard.

Malik’s hand rests on the mattress, its thumb nestled across the rough palm of the larger hand laid out in his own. The warrior’s fingers rest loosely curled around his thumb, held down by the weight of Altaïr’s other, left hand that is clasped over this join. Malik’s remaining, freed hand doesn’t lie atop their three combined ones. Instead, it’s curled around Altaïr’s left wrist. At intervals when he feels the claws of sleep scratch at the insides of his skull, Malik digs the length of his thumb into Altaïr’s inner wrist to listen to his pulse. It’s faint, and drowsy, but it’s there reminding Malik of his duty tonight.

Tonight has passed, but Malik’s duty drags on into the morning. He is to guard over Altaïr, to chase away the nightmares that would assail him. It’s a duty returned in kind. For that one night after the Massacre when Altaïr guarded over him.

Malik’s thumb shifts anew across map learned by heart. The thumb resting between Altaïr’s palms. Atop the palm, across the curving path at the roots of his fingers, Malik counts the calluses, anew. He knows each. Their shape, their number, their form. Counts how long it would take to soften each one of them. In the midst of this path, where Altaïr must have gripped the sword stiffer, he prods against the toughened callus, as if nudging the tip of his thumb would rid the man of these aftermaths of war. When his touch ceases to have aim or purpose, he puts it to a rest across this tough, curving path and looks up at his husband once more.

His face is slack, a blank page not so bare but speaking tacitly of the warrior’s sleep, of the tranquil rest he is enjoying.

How much sleep did he have to forfeit during the war? How many meals? How many battles did he see? How many death catchers did he have to made, how many friends to bury? How many years did he truly spend in war? Was it seven, as news and documents accurately report? Or dozens that fester inside a person, unattached to any written number? Malik lived through one single night of Massacre. He relived countless more. Does the same weight rest on the shoulders of this warrior? Had Malik been given more time to ponder, he might have started sorting out the variety of answers to self-imposed questions.

He feels the twitch-and-grasp of Altaïr’s hand long before he sees the man wake.

The melody of his breathing gives a small gasp and fades. Between the sudden clasp of ten rough fingers, Malik’s trapped thumb is almost crushed. Altaïr seeks out their join of hands before he launches into a hunt for Malik’s face, he stares, bewildered, he wakes as if from a nightmare afraid that he had let Malik’s hand slip from his hold during the night. When he finds them joined still, calmness doesn’t invite itself swiftly.

Altaïr’s face is the visage of a handsome man and nothing very brilliant on it—a naked expression of irrational fear, a mien of dread. The disorder is considerable and many other allusions remain unintelligible to Malik, yet panic stands out. The panic in Altaïr’s eyes a round and filthy thing. Malik takes a positive pleasure in seeing things dirty on Altaïr’s face, and this is the upside. The downside comes with calmness, and the bashfulness it ushers in on Altaïr’s face.

By the time the amber of the warrior’s eyes assumes focus, Malik is a mishmash of thought, emotion, expectation. The possibility of any sort of communication between them is barred by the strange habit of Malik’s walling up a fence of pride. He is not hostile, but stripped off words and awaiting Altaïr’s instead. Altaïr has none to spare.

The violence of his grip on Malik’s hand mellows out but he doesn’t give up hold on this soft hand, this unending source of safety and peace. Malik offers no word—a bleak version of his own self from yesterday night prompting Altaïr to speech. In the solitude of his thoughts Malik does poke and interrogate and the question he raises is why his dogged silence persists—what purpose it serves, and who of them two wants it to continue, and why. One cannot say it’s mere idleness on his part, for an idle man can’t contemplate this much. He is simply trapped by a prideful routine which makes thought of giving in impossible. He slaves away for pride. Pride is an exacting master.

Silence is Altaïr’s old friend rediscovered. He expects no words, for he never allowed his affection either recognition or food.

It comes to him, as focus settles more steadily into his other senses, that they have crossed the threshold of morning. It’s already more than Altaïr is used to sleep, and more than Malik would have stayed in bed were it not for Altaïr. It comes to him, as steady as morning light trickles into the room through Malik’s secret corner, that he has unintentionally kept Malik from work. The boy is also  curiously closer than he was when Altaïr drifted off. One more shift and he could allow himself into Altaïr’s hold. His face doesn’t betray such intentions, nor does Altaïr expect them. Instead, it’s a face tired. Two dark, dark eyes sunken in two dark circles. This is the kind of effect that fatigue of a sleepless night has upon one’s face.

His peace has cost Malik a sleepless night.

He buckles beneath the weight of such a price, the effects of this sacrifice are unappreciated, but it was an expense freely given and Altaïr appreciates it for the free choice it was. He knows the sweet sacrifices of a free choice, he once offered them to a child of ten he guarded overnight with no regard for self-preservation. Altaïr isn’t bound to return what was given freely, but answering it with affection is a move as desired as it is risky. It is a wish wedged between his desire and hesitation, it nags and nags and nags him until at last, in pure spite, the wish puts itself right before his eyes, where Altaïr is bound to trip over it.

The smaller body of his husband is already close, he needn’t draw his hand across for his lips to touch it, a small lift is all he requires. He does what could leave a man vigorously beheaded or mercifully spared, he doesn’t know which outcome he will come to face, but Malik’s hand is unresisting as he steals it up, turns it over, wraps fingers around the join of Malik’s fingers to pull them back in a gentle arch and reveal the stretch of his soft palm.

He kisses once, to relieve Malik of duty. Once, but his lips linger.

Malik’s palm is surprisingly warm for someone who is cold. Malik’s thumb, the only finger free from Altaïr’s grasp, has come to rest above Altaïr’s upper lip, unintentionally obstructing the only passageway for breathing, and Altaïr has as much time to allow his lips to linger on Malik’s palm as he has breath. It’s a disturbingly short amount of time. Until Malik shifts, glides his thumb up to the tip of Altaïr’s nose. Altaïr’s clasp unwinds even as his kiss lingers, but Malik doesn’t retreat. He slinks down Altaïr’s cheek, slopes down his jaw, his touch is timid against the prickle of Altaïr’s stubble, it reaches hesitantly up to the soft of his earlobe where it marks the ultimate border and retreats therefrom. Altaïr allows this retreat. It’s easy to shift the blame on morning work he has kept Malik from.

“Apologies,” he rasps soon before the touch will be gone from his face. The softness of Malik’s fingers remains but a lingering memory and Altaïr’s thoughts are numerous, untidy, miscellaneous, but he knows why he’s apologizing.

“None required.”

Malik’s voice is a whisper. Much-desired, louder than the soaring commotion the warrior laid aside inside himself.

“Sleep,” Malik tells him.

Altaïr obeys.

 

* * *

 

It could have been anything but free will. It could have been a remembrance of the night seven years prior and a returning of a favor, a repayment of a debt.

These thoughts harass Altaïr upon waking.

It could have been an hour, it could have been hours since he allowed himself into more sleep at Malik’s command. When he leaves the unmade bed to wander off into the kitchen, he is halted by a display in the first room, their biggest room with table and sofa.

On the table is a bowl. The one from yesterday, refilled.

Of Malik, there is no trace.

He left pursing duties and work, down in the community courtyard. He left behind a bowl of Nokem’s eyes. Nokem’s, for Hiba’s require the task of peeling the almonds and Malik had little time to spare. He spared enough to make his husband a treat for breakfast. Or was this, too, a returning of long-owned favor. A borrowed kindness to even the scales of care Altaïr bestowed upon him seven years ago? The latter beats the very essence of this sudden care, wears Altaïr's already battered spirit thin. Altaïr wants no more balance between them. No shifting of weighs, no returning of favors.

The round cake atop the sweet mound is still warm when Altaïr takes it, the glaze of melting honey still victim to the warmth of fresh-baked dough. He takes a bite, and inside the cake is the first hint of Malik's hurry. Pressing duties didn't allow the making of custard and he filled the cakes with peach jam instead. With crushed hazelnuts mixed in. They busy Altaïr's teeth while the warm filling of sweet fruit soaks his mouth with saliva and his chest with warmth.

Next to the bowl, a smallish clay pot with contents actively used, as near half has been scooped out overtime. A salve for skin. A buttery-creamy-soft salve smelling of a plant Altaïr couldn’t classify even if he had to, yet something Malik seems to use on daily basis.

So poor is his understanding of these two gestures, not a word he can utter. But his belly answers for him, with a disgraceful rumbling which it sets up at sight and smell of sweets. He swallows another bite but he can scarcely swallow the meaning of warm food and personal salve for his parched hands.

Food made with such attention can't be mere returning of favor. It must be a sign of growing care. Altaïr may well be on another fool's path forged by scheming gods, but the path he must walk today to have Al Mualim relieve him of duty doesn't feel as daunting anymore.

There is something to return to.

It's no faultless household, but they are marching towards improvement.

 

* * *

 

“You grieve me, Altaïr. You grieve me deeply.“

The sting in Altaïr’s chest is expected and results quite naturally from Al Mualim’s already awaited disappointment. He bends his neck but his head remains fixed. This gesture of obeisance doesn’t appease the man, however.

“You forget your place, Altaïr. It eludes your memory that my consent once delivered a husband to your arms.” Al Mualim’s voice is not hostility itself, but it steeps dangerously near it. Altaïr sees it for what it is. Altaïr had rightfully expected Al Mualim to attempt tightening a leash around his neck, for his loyalty that seems to be slipping through the man’s fingers. Altaïr’s intentions don’t drift towards that particular outcome, yet putting a shield before Malik is what springs to his mouth before denial of implied betrayal does.

“My husband took no part in my decision. I would turn towards more respectable ventures, Master. Not as a bodyguard.” His neck is bent low, a sign of submission. For the hardships he had endured in war, he already feels relieved of his command, if not of loyalty to him.

“You do not condone my methods...” A realization, not question. It sounds as if this thought struck Al Mualim’s mind only now. Altaïr lifts his gaze enough to catch the familiar, deliberate, thoughtful stroking of an ashy beard. He awaits whatever thoughts ail the man to find his ears soon, he is ready to hold his ground against persuasion of any form.

“Your concerns are well-founded, Altaïr. Yet we must sweep obstacles for the better good of everyone. Where grounds are not given freely, we must buy; where they won’t be sold, we must take. Demolition of old allows for new construction.”

Al Mualim’s convictions are a great argument with a striking flaw.

Altaïr’s neck strains from the low bend, his voice endures the strain of a low pitch. Yet in his beliefs, Altaïr is tenacious.

“But it’s not for sale, Master.”

“Everything is for sale, Altaïr. It is only a matter of price. Law must bend towards better purpose.”

Altaïr feels he is in no position to question Al Mualim’s decisions. The man’s shoulders are weighted down with experience, he has a far larger overview of what is traversing within the city and between city-states. Al Mualim was the one to warn them of foreign threats. He was the one to prove that the nobles have betrayed them, sold them out to foreigners like mere cattle. Altaïr is no position to pose arguments against the man’s decisions. Al Mualim has only ever endeavored to sustain their community and there exist only three notions Altaïr firmly believes in: the sanctity of community, the uprightness of their faith, the rare specimen of unadultered loyalty. Loyalty like that of his husband. Loyalty he married to selfishly keep for himself, under excuse of saving a child’s life, to offer example of his master’s mercy in the bloody aftermaths of a Massacre.

“I believe in the divinity of our community,” Altaïr says, hopes his final oath is enough to relieve all three of them of undesired duty, “You’ve been fighting for seven years to keep it upright and I am ever loyal to you, Master. But your way is not my way.”

Al Mualim heaves a heavy sigh.

“You grieve me, Altaïr.”

And with a whisk of Al Mualim’s time-worn, weathered hand, Altaïr’s last cord to warriors is cut off.

 

* * *

 

Altaïr entered as a bodyguard, he exits a citizen.

The fundamental irony of this is that Altaïr was not a warrior when he entered Al Mualim’s fortification, nor is he a warrior as he spills out into the walled courtyard, yet he dons his full armor—a constant relic of past he no longer lays claims on. He can’t part with his own before Ezio and Desmond part with theirs. None dare break the ice.

Altaïr joins them in the courtyard, the three plain civilians in full armor, a comical sight among the throng of armed foreigners that mill about the grounds of inner courtyard of Al Mualim’s fort. The duo has waited outside while Altaïr ventured in to bear the burden of talk with Al Mualim, with anticipation regularly interrupted by the clusters of foreigners infesting the inner court and then by a collection of newly-arrived wagons.

“I bring you glad tidings—”

Altaïr never gets to relay to them Al Mualim’s decision.

A number of wagons trundles inside, all covered, and the gate shuts behind them.

Where the shapeless forms covered with shapeless cloth atop wagons reveal little of their contents, the stench hides no secrets. Around, the stale, fetid stink of blood begins to spread.

The wagons are rolled past the three warriors, as if to spite them. From the wagons the stench of death keeps spreading. A stench of many bodies. Bodies too freshly plucked from life to reek of such inhumanity. The sheets atop are covers of covers, they reveal nothing of blood, nor of horrors beneath. Once the gates are shut and public view categorically shut off, the foreigners—a shady bunch collected from missions of last night—pull the first covers off to expose the fruits of their labor, as if to parade to the warriors what they’ve missed by desertion, while in truth they do so to flaunt off their helplessness.

Three warriors, three citizens. Civilians.

On second layers of sheets is blood. Beneath are heaps of bodies. Completely thrashed. As if they’ve just rolled in a wagonload of garbage. A lower part of a body, male, the torso isn’t there. An arm, small—a child’s limb. Bodies in pieces. Even the priest children. Massacred, tortured, mangled—a horror different from that of a battle.

It would be too dangerous to show an honest reaction, it would be a triumph in the face of the foreigners awaiting to see their reactions while the covers peel off to show the leftovers of last night’s ‘mission’.

Altaïr’s grief is cultivated only on the outside. Rage is cheap money. It won’t help anyone. Grief will only serve to lift the rotten spirits of foreign mercenaries. It feels as though they’ve jumped from one war into another, one led on the grounds of their sacred city, now defiled by those they believed they defeated in battle. Why has Al Mualim allowed them here? For what purpose? For whose benefit?

Altaïr ties his gaze to ground and dirt beneath, helpless. The less he looks the easier he can remove the reaction of a grieved citizen from his loyalty to Al Mualim. The less he looks, the less he thinks. He needs an exit. In his loyalty, he is not alone. From the corner of his eye, Altaïr sees Ezio in spirits much alike. Grief and shock and helplessness and other more delicate emotions Ezio has locked through sheer weight of shackles of obedience. Shared sentiment is what alleviates present sight they’ve been exposed to—accidentally but on purpose, no doubt—and even though Altaïr can’t catch sight of Desmond’s face the promise of mirrored pain he imagines there gives his own grief-and-rage reprieve, since it’s a burden shared.

Desmond is half a step at his and Ezio’s front, has been there ever since the wagons rolled in.

It’s not Altaïr who finds on Desmond’s face not a mirror of his, of Ezio’s, not grief-and-rage but rage-and- _fury_ , it’s Lucy.

A woman who has only now escaped the shadows of the fort to join them. Her work is done with simple efficiency, with no tolerance for the ways of these foreigners, and so bundled are her orders in a foreign language (for these foreigners don’t speak theirs), so dogged her covering of bodies to give them a thread of dignity, that she appears a woman who agreed to aid in something she doesn’t stand for.

Altaïr doesn’t see Desmond’s face, but Lucy does.

Their joined triple presence is an ill-concealed surprise, she doesn’t pay them attention with more than a quick check-over—a hiding of shame rather than disregard for their persons. She expects them to leave. Altaïr expects them to leave. Ezio expects the same.

Desmond won’t budge.

Ezio taps at his shoulder, he doesn’t flinch. Ezio and Altaïr exchange looks, they consider pulling Desmond back, physically if it need be, to arrest him from whatever keeps him cemented to the spot. Ahead, Lucy is issuing orders. Not for a grave to be dug. Not even for the bodies to be added to the mass grave. To be thrown into the ocean instead, far from the waters of their island, into seas remote from the grasp of the city. Hiding evidence. Feigning disappearance. Altaïr remembers Robert’s demand for hoods, and now he understands better. To veil themselves from the wandering eye of artists who roam nights in search of late walkers to sketch, of starry nights to paint, of sights to burn to canvas. Their identities may well have been captured by some wandering artist. The reason for yesterday’s anonymity has been clear to Altaïr even before he escaped temple grounds, but pieces fit themselves together into a wholesome picture only slowly. They may ponder, they may wonder. Their hands remain tied. A belief not shared by all three warriors.

Lucy is within the range of the second wagon jotting down numbers when the leader of this questionable group of foreigners—a foreigner of position far above Abbas’ but far below Robert’s or Lucy’s—throws a taunt at Desmond, a man unmoving against the silent attempts of Altaïr and Ezio. He pulls off a white cover, he peels back the bloody one below, off the edge of the wagon Lucy had attempted to shroud a moment before to conceal and bar from the sight of warriors. The leader of this subhuman horde of foreigners points at a particular corpse.

“Good cunny,” he taunts in dregs of their language. A dull man speaking broken language, a broken man speaking dull language.

Altaïr is near afraid to look. When he does, his grip on Desmond’s forearm doubles—maybe it shouldn’t have, on second thought maybe it has been his and Ezio’s grip on Desmond’s arms that propelled the man forwards—his biceps seem to swell under influence of wounded rage, he slips through their fingers with ease. It’s a curious sensation, being a slave to revenge where they should have intervened to pull Desmond back, being a slave’s slaves. Yet they allow Desmond to march on towards the gloating leader with his hand pointed at two victims of rape, two young priests sullied, defiled, disgraced before death.

Lucy doesn’t know Desmond, and she doesn’t know what to expect as he draws nearer in his furious stride.

The sum of it is that Desmond is a slave of rage, a wasted slave, doing stupid and largely unnecessary work of trying to exact revenge. She expects blows, she expects a brawl. The foreigners don’t stand a chance against these three warriors. No matter where the scales of strength weigh heavier, Desmond is about to do himself harm and she won’t let him. She nears the captain of the band in a stride mirroring Desmond’s, they approach at the same time, they meet at the recently-uncovered wagon.

The band is no match for three warriors. But strength matters not. Lucy knows the outcome of the warriors’ provoking Al Mualim’s foreign mercenaries, she knows the heavy price Desmond will pay for killing.

She is there as a translator and mediator, it’s what she tells herself. She is there to keep Desmond at bay, to keep him at work, ultimately, because of her more-than-vague feeling that he will be dangerous if she gives him a moment of leisure.

Lucy lifts her arm to bar Desmond from access to the captain—a foreigner whose face once swollen with gloating now shrank into muted fear and a farce of confidence. Desmond never breeches the border of Lucy’s arm, he never aimed to strike the captain. The captain believes the warrior struck still for either fear of consequences or Lucy’s interference, either of those, or both.

Her arm is not needed, but she keeps it square against Desmond’s bare chest, it seems as if she is pushing him away from folly—a confidence of a women against the reluctance of a warrior—but the truth is far from it. Lucy stands almost wedged between Desmond and the captain, and she is equally numbed as the latter. Of the three of them only Desmond knows what he’s doing.

“Tell him... that his mother is a whore.”

Desmond’s voice is uneventfully calm.

At the back of Lucy’s hand, his heart is a restless chime of beats, and she holds her hand against this warm drum in the limp self-conscious fashion of someone whose grasp of the situation is eluding their understanding, before she turns to the captain.

“ _Your mother is a whore_ ,” Lucy translates.

“And that he looks like a pig.”

“ _And you look like a pig_.”

Desmond takes a breath unburdened by words, and then:

“In fact, you’re an insult to humanity,” for the first time, he addresses the man directly. His mask of calm slips a sliver down his face and seeps into his tone—a momentary slip-up. Lucy sees through this elaborate mask, she sees Desmond’s act for the cultivated anger it is. It has an aim. She sees the act, not the aim.

“ _In fact, you’re an insult to humanity_ ,” she repeats.

“And if he wants to kill me, it’ll be harder than beating children. But maybe he does it because he doesn’t have a dick.”

Lucy opens her mouth to translate and it sews itself shut in the blink of a moment.

Desmond grabs a handful of leather feathers of his warrior skirt, he pulls down his loincloth. Just like that, he pulls his cock out.

Both the captain and Lucy drop gazes, the latter snaps her gaze away and then up at the captain.

“Get your dick out,” Desmond says.

“ _Get your dick out_.”

The captain returns Lucy’s look with one of his own—an ugly cross of smirk-and-fear plastered across lip—and never receives instruction or sympathy that doesn’t come his way in any case. Lucy stares at him to avoid looking elsewhere.

“Do not look at her, _I’m_ your enemy!”

Desmond’s yell startles all. Lucy may have flinched, she is unsure, but she avoids sharing looks. It’s useless, it’s foolish. In her eyes is deepest admiration, maybe more. She needn’t let him know. Not while he’s yelling profanities at her subordinate with his cock out. It’s foolish. It’s useless—Desmond doesn’t even see her. If she side-stepped to put herself between them, he wouldn’t even recognize her. There is something heart-rending in the solemn expression of his pale sawdusty face. Something that stops the drum in her own chest where his is beating with fury.

“Now come on, let’s see your dick.”

“ _Come, let’s see your dick_ ,” Lucy repeats mechanically. She stares at the captain’s face staring at the warrior’s.

“What are you, a eunuch?”

“ _Are you a eunuch_?”

For another moment, Lucy keeps her hand still on Desmond’s chest and her blind fingers soldered into a fist, for just another moment she doesn’t understand what he’s doing and is consequently afraid, not of what he will do but of what will happen to him if he does. The captain stands grounded, and her questions are equally numberless, but she plays proxy.

“Or did your mother bite it off when she fucked you?”

“ _Or did your mother bite it off wh_ —“ She breaks off. She understands now.

“Come on, why do you let me insult you? I thought you were a man?”

“ _Why do you let me insult you? I thought you were a man_.”

Desmond presented her a sample of his thoughts and put her head to working. Behind, Altaïr and Ezio stand ready to fight, hands on swords. In this fight, they are three. Three men and two paths. Desmond didn’t come here to draw sword. Spilling blood was his second path.

“Come on, fucker, you wanna strike me? You wanna rape _me_?!”

“ _You want to strike me_?” Lucy translates picking the anger off Desmond’s words. She, too, is heading down Desmond’s first path, and for this she doesn't need all of his rage.

Behind, Altaïr and Ezio stand guard waiting for the first sign of violence. It’s how they think. And they think wrong. They haven’t set Desmond loose. They haven’t understood the simple brilliance of Desmond’s vulgarity, the profoundness of his stratagem. Bright and honorable. Two among many features hidden well behind a treadmill of no expectation, but Lucy sees his worth for what it really is, however concealed to his comrades. She minds not. She sees in him what escapes notice, what others don’t, and it excites her.

“Perhaps you coward require advantage to still your trembling knees, huh!?”

Desmond unsheathes his sword—it’s flung to ground.

“Come on!”

Translation is needless. Words are needles.

“ _Come_ _ON_!”

Orders are needed.

Desmond has given her an excuse to issue orders. Ones that go against Al Mualim’s. When she turns to the captain (she can't remember allowing her gaze to stray to Desmond’s livid face), she speaks all that Desmond has hoped to achieve.

“ _You’ll bury the remains with dignity. You’ll bury them in the mass grave_.” Not throw them into deep seas to discard evidence. Not remove priests from their native soil, not from their community. Giving the victims a shred of dignity fell on deaf ears when Lucy proposed it before their gathering. There were no arguments for leaving the remains on island, no persuasion strong enough to have Al Mualim bury them atop the volcano at least, no reason to leave trace for their disappearance to be linked to the foreigners.

The captain scrams from sight issuing these new orders to the band.

Of all three—four, if Lucy were to be included in this honorable trio—it has been Desmond who untied his own wrists to drive them into changing orders to give his fellow citizens a semblance of a decent burial on soil where they were born and raised. Desmond, whose head didn’t stray into folly when his heart did while his mind plotted against possible threat of punishment. The hearts of his comrades suffer along, yet the hearts within their chests beat on different paths. Ezio’s heart is with his family, his sister and mother. Altaïr’s heart beats for his husband. Desmond has no such restraints.

Suddenly for no earthly reason Lucy feels immensely sorry for him and she longs to say something real, something with wings and a heart, but the birds she has wanted settle on her shoulders and head only later, when she remains alone and not in need of words.

At the back of her hand, there is no warmth. Desmond retreats, marches off and then through the smaller gate, with Ezio and Altaïr at his tail.

There is a great deal of hushed whispers.

Resigned to the new orders, the band makes no commotion.

They see Lucy not as a superior who answered the incensed pleas of a warrior, they see in her a superior engaged in a pacification program, someone who just stopped unnecessary bloodshed—an excuse she will later be able to present before Al Mualim, an order she can blame on emergency to prevent skirmish and death. That captain was too happy getting the order telling him to bury the bodies, thinking he has escaped death. Lucy now knows that Desmond only wanted to stoke him until provoked so that he could kill him. Waiting for either Lucy to order them around, or waiting to trigger an attack instead of starting it himself. Had Desmond struck first, all three warriors would have been punished severely. Had Desmond been attacked and subsequently retaliated, he would not have been held responsible for the first blow and death that followed it. Desmond had relied on their fear of warriors to open his first path—the foreign band knows they wouldn’t survive three armed warriors.

In untying himself, Desmond untied her hands—he, a man with no ties and a loose tongue.

 

* * *

 

A distance off the gate of Al Mualim’s fort, three men that are no longer warriors stand in silence. Of like experienced after escape from temple grounds last night. In this repeating of silence doubled in grief, they think with same head even as their hearts beat in different sides of their chest.

“I need a drink,” Desmond cuts through the hush. Desmond’s expression lends itself to multiple interpretations.

Altaïr’s mind strays to other means of escape, he thinks of soft hands with the scent of soap and dark eyes softened to his troubles. He craves the touch of smooth hands he’s grown fond of, but he clasps his hand on Desmond’s shoulder, then around it, and down his back to steer him towards the nearest pub. For Desmond, he can drink his afternoon away. Ezio doesn’t follow right away.

He turns to find him rooted to the spot.

“Forgive my haste but I’m expected elsewhere,” Ezio says. His decision is not a threat to their camaraderie, but unexpected. He does approach them then, he does put his hand to Desmond’s shoulder, he does take the man into his arms and encounters no resistance.

“I must attend to business. I leave you to loving hands,” Ezio says with a watered smile. He grips below Altaïr’s shoulder, and departs soon thereafter, assured that Desmond is in best hands.

 

* * *

 

“A real rat, you say?”

“And mice, my friend. And small rabbits.”

“All this for an eagle?”

“All for an eagle, my friend. Alive, too.”

“An eagle for a pet. How odd.”

“No one sells rats and mice around here, I know the market inside-out— _no one_!”

“Eagle for a pet. Very odd, very odd, indeed.”

Ezio listens to this dazzling succession of gossip with half an ear and many a hope that they will move on.

He’s been biding his time. Lurking for a proper chance to lure Leonardo into a closer exchange, half-frantic between greed and fear, for Leonardo is a man with no talent for wandering into traps. A man with an uncontrollable smile. In body he is very handsome, of much shrewdness, most temperate in bodily pleasures, but as for the pleasure of mind—insatiable. Little wonder, then, that he defies Ezio’s advances, however crafty, however wise. Perhaps unwise might not be a sidetrack but path towards progress.

“Leonardo?” Ezio remembers to prompt gruffly—a move long overdue. Had he not interrupted Leonardo’s chatter with a merchant, it would have gone on forever, or his hands would have given in at last. Leonardo sends his farewells as prompted per Ezio’s tacit request, and then he saunters off. Ezio pulls his shoulders back to renew his strength, he shifts the crates in hands and the reminder of this weight only serves to make him sigh, but promise of better outcomes goads him on.

He follows after the blond weaving between the multitude of people.

He makes haste despite protesting muscles, wary as new stalls and shops begin to inveigle Leonardo’s wayward attention. It’s best if he reminds the man that all his purchase has already been made, loaded onto Ezio’s lone hands, sealed in crates. He skips up towards him in time with the man leaning to hover over the rich offerings of nuts and dried fruit, from rich prunes and sour cherries, to salted pistachios and candied pecans. Leonardo is too persistently on the look-out for diabolical pitfalls (it’s how Ezio is wont of calling stalls that arrest the man’s attention), and Ezio too painfully on the alert lest their erratic surroundings carries Leonardo’s badly-behaved curiosity adrift. He must step in quickly this time before Leonardo eases himself into more gab and chitchat, yet he is but the dissident toe to the foot that steps steadily towards new and exciting sights and his efforts are weak and feeble.

“Look, Ezio!” The man beckons with a rare kind of excitement, pointing at a particular bowl.

Ezio shifts, he has to swap sides to be able to look sideways because peering down just won’t do, but he settles back-to-shoulder with Leonardo at last. He frowns at the particular bowl of spectacularly ordinary walnuts but he doesn’t want to dampen Leonardo’s livened spirits.

“I’d prefer almonds.”

Leonardo elbows him—a move altogether too unexpected and sudden but lacking force to throw him off balance.

“Not the nuts, Ezio—the bowl. Look at the bowl.”

Without the slightest notion of what awaits him beyond simple nuts, Ezio sets his gaze loose to behold another one of Leonardo’s unforgettable digressions. He sees the rim of intricate silver-work peeking from the mound of walnuts but he suspects it to be only the crowning of a [shell bowl](http://i01.i.aliimg.com/photo/v0/111859969/shell_bowl_crafts_with_silver_art.jpg), if the neighboring bowls are any clue. Leonardo sinks into a crouch, he peeks from beneath, he prods, he tilts the bowl almost enough for a handful of walnuts to stray into the adjacent bowl of hazelnuts, he thumbs along the side of the bowl Ezio can’t see from this height while the merchant follows this admiration noiselessly, with an air of mute satisfaction.

“Mother of pearl?” Leonardo inquires with curiosity somewhat soiled by confidence in his own guess. The merchant—a graying, fatherly figure with a mustache thick enough to hide smiles from lip but not from eyes—nods laconically, in a monotone gesture teeming with pride. Leonardo beams utterly helplessly, like a child, with gaze climbing up and down the work of art, snapping up an eyeful of words, reeling them off inside his own head.

“What beautiful craft!”

“My daughter’s work,” the merchant says and the source of earlier pride delivers itself. The bowls must be a private gift, a father’s pride and treasure displayed selflessly. Leonardo has preferred putting a bar between his curiosity and his mouth, but it draws itself out and he dives into luck.

“The price of such craft?”

“Not for sale,” the merchant declines respectfully.

Leonardo clicks his tongue.

“Suspected as much,” he interrupts himself there and cocks his eyes at the bowl, with subtle disappointment on lips where the brightness of his eyes did not quite reach—a defeat. First of a kind Ezio spotted on the man’s face, one that knocks every Ezio’s spirit to ruins.

“Please convey my admiration for your daughter’s craft, my friend,” Leonardo appends before pointing at another bowl, “A portion of almonds then. Unless they are your daughter’s craft as well.”

The merchant chuckles good-naturedly before he measures a wrapping of plain almonds. Leonardo’s gaze is not glued to the bowl anymore, it’s climbing other stairs on lookout for new adventures, but Ezio own spirit is yet full of flaws. He tries, laboriously, to resist temptation while he watches coin pass from Leonardo’s hand to merchant’s and almonds from merchant’s to Leonardo’s, but he has a sudden craving to restore Leonardo’s expectations.

“How high a price would be appropriate for the bowl?” Ezio offers glibly, though he is relatively convinced the attempt is wishful thinking. He never receives an answer.

“Come, Ezio,” Leonardo tugs him along as they dive into the stream of people milling through the wide tunnel. Ezio complies, if only because he’s convinced that the bowl has no price and that his arms will truly give out if he doesn’t put his muscles to a rest in near future.

Ezio possesses more than enough coin to order a cart, but his pride won’t allow it. He has made it his task to carry the crates back to Leonardo’s shop even if his arms drop off the moment he unloads his baggage. Muscles may hurt and ache, but pride once discarded can’t be sewn back together.

Ahead of him, Leonardo is untying the wrapping to peek into the almonds, without sampling this impulsive purchase. He then ties it up leaving Ezio to yield to confusion. Ezio is tortured by this sentiment for a moment longer before Leonardo spins around dropping the almond wrapping atop the crates before Ezio’s very nose.

“Your reward,” Leonardo explains and the noble stares at it in prolonged confusion, with only a part of this luggage stolen through his brief explanation. Ezio’s quandary is as follows: he failed in his first advances but this man invited him to a joined stroll through Sheker’s market so it cannot be regarded as absolute failure. He hoped to pry the man open but he proved a bright spirit with a fair smile and precarious nature. Ezio hoped to lure him in, but for all he knows Leonardo might well be aware of what his aim has been all along. He knows what Ezio wants and it’s not what he wants.

Ezio’s expectation, once light and unburdened by petty complications and sweetened by no more than the man’s handsome appearance, now hangs low with a load which keeps piling up in sync with crates he’s hauling after Leonardo. After hours spent in his company, that same expectation folded itself in the center and shrank until it became a mere sprout, at odds with his wishes which continue to burgeon and swell with each new discovered page of Leonardo’s person.

While Ezio toys with strategy, Leonardo halts for a fleeting moment to extend his arm overhead and snap off a solitary flower stem—it’s time enough for Ezio to catch up close enough to have whiff of him.

Sheker’s market is a half-tunnel—or one tunnel made up of two parts, one stone, one living—spread into a half-circle of two blind ends with a store at each summit. This half-circle half-tunnel that curves like a bow has but a single entrance, set right into the middle of this stunning crescent structure where it connects after its straight collision into the curve. On its other side, this wide path of this straight entrance tunnel expanding left-and-right into both wings of Sheker’s market leads out onto the expanse of the open cattle-market outside, lovingly referred to as the cattle-forum. Inside, Ezio and Leonardo stand below the living, flowery roof of the curved tunnel of this small cog on the big machine that makes the city.

“I’ve heard their perfume increases appetite. Their essential oils, on the other hand, are quite relaxing,” Leonardo sniffs at the flower cluster, for emphasis, then drops the purple flower cluster atop a crate where it slots itself neatly beside the almonds, “You should take your helmet off, Ezio.” He finishes disjointedly.

“I would if you’d cease piling up on my load,” the noble can’t flee some bitterness, reminded of his heavy predicament. _I’ve heard they are eaten as aphrodisiac_ , festers at the end of his tongue.

[Daga’s Teardrops](http://www.jeanniejeannie.com/wp-content/uploads/2012/03/1303733710_w0p67.jpg).

Attractive to the eye, potent for the senses. A flower of gods.

The story goes that [Ya’ar](http://the-king-of-novices.tumblr.com/post/114871631011/live-forever-or-die-trying-the-pantheon-6-10), the god of forest, swathed every strip of land with plants, that they could tell him of every corner of the island, that they could narrate to him all that they discovered on soil. But plants could not grow below water, below sea. Time and again he attempted to make them grow underwater, with no success. Until the mermaid goddess [Daga](http://the-king-of-novices.tumblr.com/post/105887755561/live-forever-or-die-trying-the-pantheon-4-10), upon seeing [Ya’ar](http://the-king-of-novices.tumblr.com/post/114871631011/live-forever-or-die-trying-the-pantheon-6-10)’s predicament, offered her blessings. Some flowers fell to the bottoms of seas as gaudy coral reefs, some remained floating like soft petals. [Daga](http://the-king-of-novices.tumblr.com/post/105887755561/live-forever-or-die-trying-the-pantheon-4-10) helped [Ya’ar](http://the-king-of-novices.tumblr.com/post/114871631011/live-forever-or-die-trying-the-pantheon-6-10) grow plants in water and in return she asked to plant flowers in air, and once [Ya’ar](http://the-king-of-novices.tumblr.com/post/114871631011/live-forever-or-die-trying-the-pantheon-6-10) promised to give her plant the life of a flower, she gave him a seed, a kernel made from her tears. Those that she collects at day blossom white, those she collects at night blossom deep-purple. Daga’s Teardrops, a gift returned.

A sophisticated, mature plant allowed to clamber up the arch of the latticed metalwork tunneled between the chilly store-chambers to Ezio’s left and stuccoed marble-columns to his right. Where a rare, precisely-measured gap between columns is deliberately left without latticework as a scenic lookout, passers-by can peruse the pond embraced by the two wings of Sheker’s tunnel-market. A pond halved by the straight entrance tunnel leading out into the cattle-forum ahead, a pond the home to roots of this vast stretch of Daga’s Teardrops covering the entire length of the two joining tunnels. They hang from the low-ceiled latticework like clouds of grapes weaving down the curving tunnel in the successive flow of white and purple.

Though above head, their smell wafts through the entire tunnel mixing with foods and spices now while Ezio is endeavoring to catch another whiff of Leonardo’s scent—a mutable, fluctuating, changing scent—yet between the heady aroma of Leonardo’s purchased herbs inside the crates and the soothing smell of countless Daga’s Teardrops, Ezio is bound for repeated failure.

“One more and we’re done, if gods choose to bless me. I’m after a rare sort.”

“Haven’t you had enough plants, Leonardo?” Ezio staunches off a whine, he’ll have to set his weight down soon to give his arms a respite.

“Wait here,” the herbalist instructs with a drolly wave of hand. He zigzags through the current of advancing people and off into the area of the second wing of the market tunnel, the right side named the Dragon wing. Dragon wing for the dragon creature Sheker once was, the Feather wing for the bird creature she morphed into as she switched loyalties during the battle of gods.

Ezio loiters in the Feather wing irresolute of what path to take, with crates in hand and no clear course, with a wrapping of almonds and a stem of Daga’s Teardrops under his nose.

People wind around and brush against him, some look at him, he must make a comical sight—a warrior in helmet and full regalia following after a beaming man, with crates of herbs in arm. Chasing after a herbalist’s enchanting smell. He looks around.

Above, behind, and ahead—flowers of tiny, sweet-smelling purple-or-white hued petals. These thin stems with huge grape-like clusters and wide, glossy green leaves catch on the swing of a wayward breeze that gallops through the side gaps in tunnel and sway on this draft for a long time like frolicking children. To the right, through the gap in tunnel—the pond and a cluster of birds frisking in the water to ease the heat of a parching sun. Along the rim of the pond stretches a strip of bank, a fertile and moist soil to host the woody vines of Daga’s Teardrops clambering up-and-over the latticework to give the tunnel shops on the left end privacy from the cattle-market outside across the pond, giving the shade from full sun and warding off heat. To the left—a chain of chambers and stores and stalls, cold and warm, spacious and small, lighted with scented oil lamps day-and-night. Below—a myriad sandals and boots and bare feet passing through the stone passage-way.

And in the middle of it—Ezio.

Ezio who walks again among the citizens who loaf the streets, Ezio gazing at bright smiles and cheery, purple-lit faces washing in velvet shadows of Teardrop petals, a noble finding himself odd after war tents, a man who listened to whispers of home now a spectator of laughter, chatter, chirrup, a warrior with sheets of no more than three weeks from the wash at good days now basking in the sensory pleasures of his city. His arms feel numb, and in his gut there are but two fears vying for his heart—the thought of years lost, the fear of wasting borrowed time. Ezio latches onto other thoughts to avoid falling out into the abyss of memory of a past time.

To catch up. To grasp time by the tail and wrench it back, to pull at its hair until lost opportunities are revisited, to overtake seven years if time permits another pull.

Ezio’s obedience to Leonardo’s command lasts for two more breaths, and not a moment longer.

He wanders off into the Dragon wing after the memorized path and finds Leonardo in dampened wits at the mouth of another herb store. He arrives to hear Leonardo offer all money he could spare for some leaves and a polite but unhelpful merchant tipping out absolutely no contents of a long-empty jar for emphasis. Before Ezio can be entrusted with the details of this failed purchase, Leonardo guides them out of the Dragon wing and into the straight passage out onto the cattle-forum.

“I need leaves of [Daga](http://the-king-of-novices.tumblr.com/post/105887755561/live-forever-or-die-trying-the-pantheon-4-10)’s gift to [Ya’ar](http://the-king-of-novices.tumblr.com/post/114871631011/live-forever-or-die-trying-the-pantheon-6-10) but they’re hard to come by,” Leonardo explains as they drift across the paved open space of the cattle-market, “The only merchant who sells them, and he has none.”

“You mean the Water Blossom?”

“Yes, Ezio, the Water Blossom,” Leonardo confirms and gestures in movement what he lacks in words as he guides them out towards the nearest benches to unload Ezio’s burden before they set off for his studio. Ezio has scarcely put them atop a vacant bench when Leonardo begins to open his crates to peek into them as if to check the state of his purchase. The plants alone are not a weight worthy of notice, were it not for the earthen pots that hosted them. Rather than for raw preparation, they are to be planted in their community garden alive as they are, to thrive and flourish for extended use over a year’s time. A herbalist, a tailor, a healer.

The scent that follows this man around is a lot like the herbs he works with. When Ezio met him first, the man had a different smell. When they set out into the market, he had a second. Now he has a third, or fourth. Beneath the shift of flowers and herbs, there is a faithful and unbroken fragrance, though weak, that seems to be Leonardo’s, and before long Ezio is catching himself in the attempt to breathe deeper and longer to draw it in, to unmask it to distinguish the man’s own scent.

“A fine purchase today,” the man tells himself as he combs through the crates. Though not addressed directly, Ezio pulls himself from a reverie and looks aside, across the second of two markets of Sheker, this goddess of gossip and story-telling and wind.

Here, at the foot of [Hiba](http://the-king-of-novices.tumblr.com/post/105028879746/live-forever-or-die-trying-the-pantheon-3-10)’s Hill, Sheker’s winds once led meek [Hiba](http://the-king-of-novices.tumblr.com/post/105028879746/live-forever-or-die-trying-the-pantheon-3-10) into a trap. A once-trap is now the hub of activity. How convenient that the market of the goddess of gossip now swarms with people exchanging an endless upwelling of stories. What was once a grave is now the joining point of humans, plants, animals. Gods.

“Teardrops are still blossoming at this time of year... It’s no good,” Leonardo mutters to himself.

Ezio takes the pains to part his gaze from the wire of large sheds, barns, and stables stretching at the foot of [Hiba](http://the-king-of-novices.tumblr.com/post/105028879746/live-forever-or-die-trying-the-pantheon-3-10)’s Hill, across the swarm of people, and to look down at Leonardo. The man has taken a seat. The benches, an almost closed circle of them, are belted around the colossal statue that marks the other end of the cattle-forum, each bench a simple lacquered plank with two holes at ends. While the holes provide a passage for the two miniature trunks, no thicker than thumbs and entwined into a wooden plait crowned with a lavish pop of foliage, the bench itself rests atop the heavy-and-large terracotta pots that have been embossed over the generations with names and initials and caricatures engraved or scratched into the surface of this clay vessel—a canvas of time where one could leave a mark as long as it did not disturb others.

“Why is it no good?” Ezio questions as he rids himself of the helmet to join Leonardo on the bench. No sooner did he claim the gap between the dwarf tree and Leonardo does the man lean in with a conspiratorial zeal to whisper:

“Sheker fell in love.”

To Ezio, this bears sense. For them to be graced with the pure luxury of a cloudless sky and warm weather during this season must be the result of Sheker’s warm winds. Only once did her winds grow kind and warm. Once, when she fell in love with the god of death.

It’s rare that Sheker would give them warm weather during the season when foliage withers, it's uncommon to have good weather when they ought to be holding a festival to pray for the goddess to give them a short season of cold winds. Why hold public spectacles and offer prayer for warm weather when it is already warm? Along the cattle-forum huge carts of hay have been steered out, wood chopped down in heaps, ready for the pyre to be lit for the festival during the first cold days. That Sheker fell in love forgetting to shift winds does sow seeds of worry.

“If she fell in love how come there’s no Water Blossoms you so desperately seek?”

Leonardo says nothing and Ezio doesn’t look at him. His gaze is climbing up the colossal statue set in the center of this fountain at their front. Above the surface of rippling water peeks a mermaid tail of goddess [Daga](http://the-king-of-novices.tumblr.com/post/105887755561/live-forever-or-die-trying-the-pantheon-4-10), chiseled from stone. Her human hand clasped around [Ya’ar](http://the-king-of-novices.tumblr.com/post/114871631011/live-forever-or-die-trying-the-pantheon-6-10)’s wooden staff, also chiseled from stone. A tangle of vines wind round the thick staff as if sprung from water itself to climb upwards and in the process of doing so these stony plant roots have created a path of veined rungs—something that’s only rarely, if ever, used for purpose of climbing up the statue. Where [Nokem](http://the-king-of-novices.tumblr.com/post/104486337526/live-forever-or-die-trying-the-pantheon-1-10)’s and [Gdila](http://the-king-of-novices.tumblr.com/post/104486350666/live-forever-or-die-trying-the-pantheon-2-10)’s city statues have genuine weapons—sacred and untouchable—this statue of Daga offering the gift of Water Blossoms to [Ya’ar](http://the-king-of-novices.tumblr.com/post/114871631011/live-forever-or-die-trying-the-pantheon-6-10) has a genuine Water Blossom atop the stone staff, floating inside what looks to a mere human as a giant’s globule of water on top, while in truth a roundish glass vessel was joined to chiseled staff to appear as a plant trapped inside a gigantic drop of water.

While Ezio’s pensive gaze scales up [Ya’ar](http://the-king-of-novices.tumblr.com/post/114871631011/live-forever-or-die-trying-the-pantheon-6-10)’s staff at a lazy pace, his thoughts soar to holding onto more profitable concerns sure to bring favorable results. It is notoriously impossible for him to fail at courting and there is nothing to be anxious about even if he disturbs the gift of [Daga](http://the-king-of-novices.tumblr.com/post/105887755561/live-forever-or-die-trying-the-pantheon-4-10) to [Ya’ar](http://the-king-of-novices.tumblr.com/post/114871631011/live-forever-or-die-trying-the-pantheon-6-10) atop the statue.

“I could get you a Water Blossom.”

It's outside before he is fully aware of what sacrilege he just uttered.

He leaps from the bench, twists around, points at the general direction of the glass ball at the apex of the stone staff of the statue, bearing Leonardo’s face in mind. It takes him utmost pains to teach his own face not to frown at seeing an expression he may already have seen and remembered when he first met the man.

“You would disturb the gods to get me a desired plant?”

“Correct,” Ezio verifies this suggestion of simple brilliance without contemplating the implications of this particular feat. He says these words before it even occurs to him that what he is suggesting is most heinous sacrilege.

Leonardo doesn't disparage his spirits, nor does he question the motives of such promise, but he squints his eyes up at Ezio with an expression that a simple look can’t convey.

“You have the balls to do this?”

“Two of them. And rather large,” Ezio boasts in a dazzling husk—a near-whisper in tone but no less pompous.

Leonardo’s calculated squint loosens, for a mere moment, before a smile lurking with utmost mischief blooms across his face pinching his eyes into a different kind of narrow.

“Oh my,” Leonardo answers in tone entirely equal, no shame in his smile, “Then I would see your words made flesh.”

“Easily conjured.”

Ezio sees that he is helpless, that he is bolder in this man’s presence. It might be the man’s resistance, or lack thereof on Ezio’s part. Whatever the case, he feels ready to climb a colossal statue to steal a god's plant.

The warrior’s intentions were initially not only dirty and shapeless but utterly graceless and he’s not sure if he would pursue a man who deserves more than shabby intentions. He is begining to acknowledge this disparity between what he has wanted him to be and what he is, but his appetite for this man gains in power instead of waning with first signs of the man’s unapproachable nature.

“Guard this for me while I’m away,” Ezio says entrusting his helmet and sword into Leonardo’s care. The man doesn’t rise from the bench but he sees him off with an intent gaze, and he follows him raptly on the path thereafter.

Even if the gods permit a human to disturb a sacred object, Leonardo doubts the conditions of his community garden will allow for a successful growth of the sacred Water Blossom that grows atop the statue independently of human interference. It needs water and they don’t have a pond. It will have to be dug, with permission of other community members, and that alone is not enough to guarantee its survival. Yet it would be a pity to withhold Ezio the pleasure of this achievement.

The warrior vaults across the wide, stony rim of the fountain and plops straight into the water. He wades out towards the center, with the stream eddying around his legs. He doesn’t climb [Daga](http://the-king-of-novices.tumblr.com/post/105887755561/live-forever-or-die-trying-the-pantheon-4-10)’s lavish tail peeking above surface, but he skims along the intricate handiwork of her carved scales wetting warm stone with a hand-cup of water as he asks for her blessing. Then he wades off between the gods where [Ya’ar](http://the-king-of-novices.tumblr.com/post/114871631011/live-forever-or-die-trying-the-pantheon-6-10) holds his staff upright—thick stone fashioned to look as if made from wood, with equally detailed work of vines creeping up the staff in a spiraling whirl. At [Ya’ar](http://the-king-of-novices.tumblr.com/post/114871631011/live-forever-or-die-trying-the-pantheon-6-10)’s feet bloom all sorts of flowering shrubs. They are genuine. Ezio doesn’t disturb these plants but he takes a hold of the staff, he reaches above his head, then pulls himself up onto the bump of the first stony vine winding around the bulk of the staff, onto the first that’s not below the water surface. And up he goes.

Theoretically, it appears easy to climb. In truth, it’s even easier.

For a seasoned warrior like Ezio, it’s no worse than laying out his bedding in a tent. He relies on his arms to keep his balance and his legs to help him ascend as he transfers his leverage onto one rung after another, onto the next bump of the coiling vine. He doesn’t chance a look over his shoulder, but whatever gap he leaves below himself he ignores gravely, comfortably. He keeps on pulling himself up and the higher he ascends the more violently a breeze rips at his armor cape seizing it in an undulating dance. Far below, where Ezio doesn’t look, the belt around the fountain is sprinkled with onlookers, there is a swell-up of noise, the clatter of curiosity, but Ezio presses forward, regularly fed by gratitude Leonardo will offer. He can imagine no other reception. This food is his bread and wine—he won’t settle for charity any longer. He is contended, valuing the outcome of this feat more than the path itself.

Ezio shifts eastward, rotates to find a thicker vine tendril, and he spends the rest of his climb upwards on this more convenient path, until he is faced with the thick ball of glass at the summit of [Ya’ar](http://the-king-of-novices.tumblr.com/post/114871631011/live-forever-or-die-trying-the-pantheon-6-10)’s staff. Though the shape of an orb, the ball is open to the skies towards the top and almost completely filled with water. Inside there is just enough space for two adults, or an adult and two smaller children, the bottom is covered in sediment and soil, and on the surface of this body of water is the Water Blossom—several of them—floating.

In a move half-bold half-deft, Ezio grasps at the thick rim of the orb after setting his weight off the highest rung of a stony vine, and pulls himself up and into the ball soon thereafter.

In the process of this, he manages to steep himself into the water until he’s drenched to bone. He stands in water up to his waist. It takes him a few moments to find proper footing removed from any risk of disturbing all Water Blossoms, although he does manage to step onto quite a few roots before he can disentangle his boots to step aside.

The intriguing heady scent of the blossoms finds his nose before he turns to inspect them. He takes a peek over the rim of the glass to look below for the first time.

The height regarded from above nonpluses him.

There are knots of people that stand at all corners of the cattle-forum, all looking up at him. There is less noise, less quarreling among them, and more milder upturned heads, and faces dress themselves in curiosity.

It is interesting to watch the crowds that watch him.

The onlookers are no longer a sprinkle around the fountain, they flock crowding the space until they’ve swallowed all traces of paved stones around the fountain. Leonardo is perched atop his bench, and seeing him hop down to jostle his way through the ring of people towards the wide rim of the fountain sets Ezio into motion and hammers through the glass of haze that has beset him.

He turns inwards, the air is less feverish when he’s not looking from above.

The sweetish reek hits his senses again.

While Daga’s Teardrops grow from water-up, Ya’ar’s Water Blossoms float atop water. As Ya’ar dropped petal after petal and blossom by blossom into water, Daga helped their roots spread to plant themselves in the soil of pond or sea bottoms. A mutual exchange that gave birth to this medicinal plant of long leathery, fleshy leaves. And while the leaves float on water, the blossom is held well above them. The flower is a burst of thick, carmin-red and waxy blossoms that release an intoxicating aroma which could perfume an entire garden.

Ezio lowers into a crouch until the water is up to his neck, until he can either turn his neck to the side to evade the heady scent or gaze right into the blossom while he touches along the bottom to pull out the roots, and he does gaze into it, with no intervention of choice.

The blossom under his nose appears to be kissed by a touch of gold at the center—a small addition to the dramatic morphing into an intense shade of red. The sight is as overwhelming as its scent.

Ezio tugs the roots out without upsetting the rest. He is not greedy, he knows better than to raid the entire gift of Daga to Ya’ar. One he will deliver into Leonardo’s hands, the rest remains where it grows sans human intervention. He pulls the roots out entirely letting the leaves and blossom float as he ponders how to actually deliver the plant to Leonardo.

His first idea proves best.

The warrior takes off his armor cape to wrap the blossom along with its long roots—curled into a loose coil below the blossom—and he ties this impromptu bundle up.

“Leonardo!” he hollers once leaned across the rim of the ball, “Catch!”

Leonardo doesn’t hurry to catch the wet bundle, having divined Ezio’s intentions while it's still falling down towards them, he allows the wrapping to plop into the fountain first. The warning he issues before this drop falls on deaf ears and even though none have made the move to fall back, there is a concoction of stunned yells and delighted shrieks of children when the smack of the bundle against surface sends a fat splatter of water around.

Leonardo wastes little time. His flicks the back of his red cape over his head in something that almost looks like a hood as he plunges down the same path Ezio took but his eyes rove up over Ezio all the time—before, during, and after pulling the soaked bundle out of the fountain—making sure the warrior won’t move. He puts the gift atop the rim and follows up, then frames his mouth with palms as he shouts up:

“Climb the same way down!”

“I can’t!”

Leonardo stares up, feels a foul bubbling of panic, and a yap of fear echo inside his ribcage.

Far above, Ezio is pulling a boot up onto the crest of the outer lip of glass. Fear is gripping him by the elbow, rooting him to the spot. He can’t explain the intricacies of slithering down the same path, down the slippery swell of the ball of glass, and the uncertainty of grasping the thick, wet rim of glass for only support while unsure of how he’ll grip the staff he can’t even see.

“I’m going to leap from here!”

“What!?” Leonardo roars stopping short. Around him struggles the flock of people, shouting and interrupting, there is a confused uproar of voices.

“I need some hay! A lot of it!” The warrior announces to the dense crowd, and the inside of his chest is a crude amalgam of fear, pride at awaiting feat, and remorse for miscalculation—all of which blend into the exhilarating mix of a less-than-smart decision.

There are murmurs of agreement.

“Ezio!” Leonardo bellows again, an unwilling, blank-headed shout as reaction to Ezio’s sudden perch atop the outer lip of the glass bubble, “What seized your brains, fool!? You’re no bird!”

In all fairness, Leonardo ought to be grateful—still, he is not. The people that pull the biggest cart of hay (those to be used as kindling for the festival pyre) between the parting crowd of people are the ones giving Ezio’s wild ideas a buoy-up and shriveling Leonardo’s chances of persuasion.

“I’ll be [Daga](http://the-king-of-novices.tumblr.com/post/105887755561/live-forever-or-die-trying-the-pantheon-4-10) then!” Ezio shouts, and the sheer volume of his voice swallows up whatever emotion there was to decipher in it.

“Daga _died_!”

“To became a god!”

Ezio crouches perched on the outer lip of the glass ball, gripping the rim for balance. Down below, a cart bursting with hay is having its load poked around and disheveled to accept him more readily, the once-tight circle of crowd loosening, and he listens to them for ten entire breaths, anxious to distance himself from present and recall the times he leaped during battles, the times Desmond and he leaped from walls into hay-water-shrubs-tents after pilfering spices.

It’s not the shouts but the tail he touched on his way up that arrests him back to present, it’s Daga who cancels reluctance to replace it by a definite station he feels growing in mind.

“Daga will guide me! It will be a leap of faith!”

He knows and he doesn’t how far he has to jump. He is tortured by the possibility of breaking a limb, or worse. The cart owners disperse, people are backing further off.

A fist of fear clasps around his heart, and then, he leaps.

In his veins is more void than blood, as if all that drives his body and spirit converges at a single point in his limbs that launch him off, off and enough the cross the border of the fountain below. He tips his body forward in right time, allows the rest to follow—the last he sees of world below is the confused greenery and colorful mass skimming along his last trace of vision before all turns a single bright-blue. He falls, face skywards.

His abdomen is beginning to heave, it’s heaving, it’s convulsed.

Bravery hauled him over the brim. Bravery falls from him in drops now and he is left to chance alone, he is gaining speed.

Until, after brief eternity, he sees more than just blue.

Hay swallows him like the buzz of voices around—he doesn’t hear beyond shouting.

Nothing hurts. His body he starts to feel only after the churn in his abdomen gives way to exhilaration. He doesn’t move until the tangle of hay is a nuisance to his vision, until the shouts are a cheer, and when he does, the grin on his own face feels alien but too proud to admit that he once feared.

The layers of hay are too thick to allow a graceful exit from cart, but protection enough to shield him as he clambers up from the indentation he caused through fall and impact. He dismounts the cart hopping down to the rim of fountain where Leonardo hasn’t budged from spot, and his legs feel light, weightless.

Ezio takes the wet sloppy bundle from the stone, dripping wet like the man himself, he extends his hand in silent offer, and for a moment between confusion and bewilderment, Leonardo stands under the spell of Ezio’s cozy, mute mirth.

The warrior is a little pale, considerably wet, and largely disheveled, with hay to show for his latest feat.

“The cost of such favor?” Leonardo says-or-whispers, and one voice is naught, one voice is one wave in the sea of shouts around.

“A gesture of friendship,” Ezio says in half-grandiosity and half-humility.

Leonardo is a simple man of many talents, a man most guarded in not being trapped by the fraudulent nature of men who change partners like they change clothes. Yet this man does a little big trick and Leonardo shrinks borders between them when he thought himself above such simple ploys.

“Received with much gratitude.” This time, it is without a doubt—a whisper. It’s without a doubt a brush of hands when his grip joins Ezio’s around the wet slop of the bundle. It’s, without a doubt, the most disarming smile a man’s lips have ever assumed in Laonardo's presence.

This is Ezio. A reckless warrior and pillager, a rich noble robbing Leonardo poor of bricks to girdle round his heart.

Leonardo loved the crooked bend of his lips long before the man himself.

 

* * *

 

When they introduce themselves to the innards of Leonardo’s studio, it’s after a long trip back and a short detour to Barzel’s market to pick up a roll of fur and skins—more weight to add to Ezio’s steadily growing baggage.

Ezio doesn’t allow his gaze to loaf about past a quick assessment of his surroundings and finds it too overwhelming to decipher in a short amount of time he plans to ascribe to it. It boasts of a strange kind of disorderly order, with a tangle of herb scents and a tangle of fabrics and cloths, and at least one of three counters of doubtful cleanliness, but all in all it’s a kind of homey disarray that matches well with Ezio, for he has no loathing for disorder as Altaïr does.

He does devote more time to assessing the only other occupant of the studio, that being an ambiguous-looking youth, a lady in a smartish blue dress with the handsomeness of a young man’s jaw. This youth sits on a bench too far wedged into the cleanest-looking counter with hands confused between sewing and picking at tea-and-two-slices of peach jam.

“Salai,” Leonardo greets, or dismisses, perhaps the latter because the youth gives a casual swing of legs short before picking up her current proceedings from the counter, with a glossy, knowing smirk of mischief—a disrobing kind of smirk that almost puts Ezio to sweating.

The youth retreats leaving them to solitude—of sight if not of silence, for Ezio has the distinct suspicion that Salai will listen in on whatever he choses to raise past whisper.

But the curiosity of Leonardo’s assistants won’t put a wedge between him and Leonardo. Now that he undertook all work (and quite a measure beyond) that had been expected of him, he expects well-deserved reward.

“What for do you intend Water Blossoms for in any case?” Ezio inquires innocently, having picked a start for set-off into conversation. Though he has mere basics of plants at grasp thanks to schooling, any start that is likely to provide Leonardo’s response is deep enough to steer off into deeper waters.

“Where should I start: potent tea against coughing, lung infections, high temperature? These three are enough to start the approaching season,” the blond trails off.

“Are you sure you’ve enough to cover all customers?” Ezio frowns at the wet bundle as he picks it up from the crates, allowing Leonardo leeway to unload the crates presently.

“For the community, yes. For customers, no.”

A coltish smile spreads across Leonardo’s lips, it scatters across his face a secretive, shadowy look of great importance, quite unrelated to the present topic, as if the herbalist-tailor-inventor knew Ezio’s course long before the warrior set off.

Ezio cannot help feeling there is something essentially wrong about the way he is trying to trap the man, and he unhinges his loose jaw further to form a question that is never meant to pass to the man’s ears, because there is a familiar figure that walks quite frankly into the room through the front door forming all Ezio’s thoughts into one single question.

“You are left off leash of your husband?”

Leonardo throws him a glare, and he feels it.

Malik dismisses him without a second glance and Ezio is desperately unhappy with his lack of response, searching as he is for something to dump his sour mood on. He is fast-approaching a comedy of trying to ensnare Leonardo into his charm, last thing he needs is Altaïr’s whelp of a husband disturbing his last attempts.

Yet the more hostile he is to Malik, the powerful the impact of Leonardo’s mirrored hostility towards him, so he sets his insults against the back of his teeth and pushes at them with his tongue until nothing is left but a mesh of meaningless words.

Altaïr’s husband strolls in with a whole menagerie of fabrics—soft and rough, dull and colorful, fur and cotton—all rolled up into a cluster of neat bundles, probably the neatest set of fabrics within these walls. These fabrics he puts atop a counter—a place that is victim to Leonardo’s sudden raid, a territory that grows only at the expanse of surrounding parcels of the counter that need to be swept off presently—and he exchanges a quick-and-short succession of words with Leonardo. There is barely enough for Ezio to stitch together other than that these are intended for Altaïr’s clothing.

With that, with a flaunt in walk and a haughty scowl, the young noble carries himself out leaving Ezio and Leonardo same as before, only a bit worse.

 

* * *

 

Altaïr wants touch or dark eyes to gaze at long before he returns home.

He spared himself wine that he could drag Desmond to the other slope of the hill where he dwells alone in a small home, and he returns sniffing after this long trail of longing.

He enters his own community beaten and livens up at the sight of his husband.

When his principles and faith crumble giving way to high walls and iron gates to rise like prison around him, Malik’s dark eyes appear like rows of tiny windows on this prison-wall, albeit barred. Altaïr looks worn and ill, and owing to his current pallor seems unshaven although he has shaved before setting out, but his gaze isn’t dimmed by it when Malik approaches him coming directly from Leonardo’s studio.

“You’ve picked a fine time to arrive,” Malik says before he steers himself near enough, “I’ve just left the fabrics you brought at Leonardo’s. Go to him at once, he’ll take measurements.”

They stand there shielding the tunnel-exit from a draft that wants free passage.

The warrior isn’t past obedience and he intends to do as he is told, despite hunger nagging at his insides.

Malik is looking up at him with an air of directness, an air of quizzical curiosity, as if he’s expecting an answer. Altaïr consults silence instead. There is a quarrel of two expressions on his face, a vile scene. He, naked to the waist, a man of power to defeat alone an enemy ten warriors strong, violently abusing the last shreds of a sad silence. There must be a light of the fire of confusion and reluctance on his face even as he does and says nothing. He is less strong than his powerfully puffed-out chest might imply—in fact, he is weak—and the wave of hopeless fatigue that suddenly submerges his top-heavy body, detaching him from reality, is a sensation not utterly unknown to wine he earlier refused. He feels drunk without a drop of wine inside him.

His appearance provokes reaction.

The furrow of brows on Malik’s face fades away as silently as it has come. Something very serious is about to happen. When it happens, it appears in the form of worry foreign to its bearer, or at least foreign when related to Altaïr. Once the shift of expressions on Malik’s face has amounted to real worry, once his dark eyes pored over Altaïr in search for injury, this single expression of worry gives Altaïr an eerie feeling, that tingle of unreality overpowers him completely.

He could accept Malik’s worry as his happiness but he doesn’t cling to this suggestion. He doesn’t, or it will turn into a summing up—a counting of the things he lost on the way to hope.

He drops his gaze, and at Malik’s sides are his arms, his hands hang loosely, gloved, much desired.

Time plunders. Coupled with war, it ravages. All the years in war he tolerated because the notion that he was protecting _someone_ rather than something livened his spirits. All he did was to protect a husband, and community. To see the tables turned, to find that a single, soft hand could protect him instead, is a truth he has divined only now.

He yearns to touch them, and to be touched. Past experience set him against touching Malik of his own accord, but seeing them, unoccupied and unthreatening, reminds him of the treat he had for himself from last night into this morning.

“We were grilling fish earlier. For dinner. I left some for you. It’s in the kitchen...” Malik adds, in a small voice, and doesn’t know what else to add. Altaïr nods but doesn’t pursue a trail up to look at his face. He longs for his hands.

He stands, lodging at that one place before Malik, unhappy and trying to disregard the quarrel in him. He stands until his simple and complex desire starts growing more and more furious. The desire keeps making little rushes forward, sticking out its face and screaming from this short distance between them to cross it, he is trying to nerve himself to make a move without quite succeeding.

Finally he bursts out as Malik makes first sign of retreat.

He seizes Malik’s right hand, he seizes his left, he _means_ the touch when he pulls them up to join them between his. Malik is too paralyzed by surprise at first and Altaïr is guiltily wolfing down the sensation of Malik’s hand in his before they’re withdrawn.

The warrior would break the long silence to exclaim something, whatever it may be, but he pinches his features together into a sullen, needy look, a shaming unashamed expression of want, and he finds Malik’s hands pliant and unresisting. The same look that harassed his face last night after Malik woke him from nightmare. It is unpleasant but it taught him what expression to use when in need of touch so he gained something from it. He measures that expression on his face, allows it to loiter on his features for a moment longer to learn that one picture as a rule of thumb, like one learns to put a puzzle together.

When he moves the hands further up, Malik consents through passive acceptance, without giving the rough side of his tongue. There is more charity than consent in his permission, but Altaïr swallows this warm meal of charity like feasts he used to gobble up in the orphanage. At least he is not treated as beast, cattle, ruffian.

He lifts the gloved hands pressing the tips of fingers to his mouth. The leather is wet, it smells of soft soaps. Of Malik’s warmth, he can feel nothing. It matters little. This touch is all he needs. He presses into the leather three long consecutive kisses, and no more, to avoid making Malik uncomfortable.

He lowers them between them, into the gap spanning short between their waists, he alternates between caress and tightening. Through gloves, he can’t feel their texture, their icy skin, nor can his trace the tips of his parched fingers across clean nails and soft knuckles, yet he crawls into the beauties of this touch and finds them to be a corner for himself free of all calamities of life.

They both find it a strain to carry on the conversation that never happened.

For a while, he has kept his head down and neck bent low, to avoid Malik’s gaze and whatever he could find on his face. A cheap boldness tells him _you must be brave_ , but he is quite weak. So he stays within the firm sight of Malik’s hands, clasped from knuckles down into his own, until a spread of goosebumps begins to climb up his forearms and beyond, and it makes little-to-no sense to allow Malik to see that a simple touch of hands leaves such trace on the hard body of a warrior.

Altaïr takes off the weight of his hand from Malik’s hands, clearing his throat and ignoring the consolation offered by the presence of his husband. He nods, again, unsure as to why and to what.

And quite suddenly, in a rush, he turns and bolts for Leonardo’s studio, although there are several hours to spare before dusk.

 

* * *

 

“What?” Ezio dashes for ignorance even when the source of Leonardo’s inquisitive frown is known to both.

“He is a noble like yourself.”

It would be absurd of Ezio to try and persuade him that Malik’s particular presence rather than just any presence isn't what gave rise to most of Ezio’s annoyance.

“And so? [Daga](http://the-king-of-novices.tumblr.com/post/105887755561/live-forever-or-die-trying-the-pantheon-4-10) was noble, and she hated [Nokem](http://the-king-of-novices.tumblr.com/post/104486337526/live-forever-or-die-trying-the-pantheon-1-10),” he retorts unwittingly steering off towards a current he hadn’t intended to catch.

“She changed her ways,” Leonardo counters, with arms crossed, in a manner so condescending and patronizing that it doesn’t befit the man at all.

“Perhaps she shouldn’t have,” Ezio says perhaps with too much zeal, perhaps too-prepared, perhaps ready to argue, and probably not ready to give in.

“Why do you condemn Nokem with such fervor, Ezio?”

The tenseness of Leonardo’s shoulders mellows out as if steeped in curiosity and weighed down by this pleasant burden, and though his arms remain crossed—a stance too loud to allow Ezio to drift closer to the man—he leans into the counter nearest to him, and he cocks his head to the side ready to explore Ezio’s unorthodox point of view.

“I shouldn’t be the one giving answer to questions of this kind. A noble speaking of nobles. Better it would be if commoners asked themselves what’s so special about nobles.”

At this, Leonardo offers a short, curiously handsome chuckle, and says, “Do I need to recount the tale of our myth for you?”

Usually, Ezio would say no, but Leonardo’s voice is somewhere between calming and exciting to his ears and he is hard-pressed to offer a vague shrug as a sign for the man to proceed with whatever he has intended.

Leonardo heaves an important sigh, his gaze falls to floor as if to recollect the pieces he hasn’t revisited for a time, and then he starts:

“The first wave of humans differed from the second in that it was created for a different purpose, a higher purpose—“

“And so the notion of justice is placed above the notion of love? Is love less noble than justice? Are commoners not part of community as anyone else?” Ezio quips in, earning for his intrusion a brief silence.

“During a distant time when death came before love, justice was held above all else. Love, though noble, came later,” Leonardo elaborates. He awaits another clashing viewpoint but no words come, so he picks himself up from his last point.

“They were forged as warriors, these first humans, to aid justice in hunting down Ga’ash after the god split himself into nine parts. Many died during battles with Ga’ash’s nine evil spirits—“

“Many died,” Ezio echoes, interrupts, “And many new were needed.”

An expression of a new discovery weaves itself delicately into Leonardo’s face, it’s solidly bound to it when the man launches into a self-satisfied smile at having grasped the source of Ezio’s discontent.

“It’s this side of the myth that gives you grievance, is it not?” It must be. Leonardo is positively convinced and his pause doesn’t last long enough to allow Ezio room for talk, “It is quite true that many warriors were perishing during the battles against the dark spirits and that [Nokem](http://the-king-of-novices.tumblr.com/post/104486337526/live-forever-or-die-trying-the-pantheon-1-10)’s ranks of humans were decimated. His warriors, though noble and strong, were not quite as powerful as to defeat them. No wonder, then, that Nokem, seeing this, instructed his fearsome warrior women to procreate.”

“Ordered them,” the warrior corrects the word to his liking.

“We are arguing semantics, Ezio. They were Nokem’s own creation. His invention to utilize at his wish.” Leonardo knows now which puzzle of the myth gives Ezio most trouble. Though he can’t argue his point joyfully, the will of gods is far beyond the grasp of human mind.

“They were human as well. Or has [Daga](http://the-king-of-novices.tumblr.com/post/105887755561/live-forever-or-die-trying-the-pantheon-4-10)’s fate been forgotten?” Ezio asks wistfully.

Leonardo is quite convinced that Ezio hates [Nokem](http://the-king-of-novices.tumblr.com/post/104486337526/live-forever-or-die-trying-the-pantheon-1-10). While their customs don’t dictate which gods individual humans should be keen on and pray to, they also don’t forbid dislike or hatred of particular gods. As long as you do not invoke a curse of gods upon yourself through deliberate attempts, no god will take it for a slight if you do not worship them. Leonardo, beside all good intentions, has no grounds to persuade Ezio into accepting [Nokem](http://the-king-of-novices.tumblr.com/post/104486337526/live-forever-or-die-trying-the-pantheon-1-10) into his personal pantheon. The choice is Ezio’s alone. Removed from Leonardo’s intervention.

“It has not been forgotten. Her story lives on,” Leonardo assures, speaks more directly to the floor than to Ezio himself, and during a moment of quiet he recalls the sad story of this much-revered goddess born human.

[Nokem](http://the-king-of-novices.tumblr.com/post/104486337526/live-forever-or-die-trying-the-pantheon-1-10)’s warrior women continued to procreate between ardent fights. They had their children, as their creator had instructed, all had them, except for one. A warrior woman who attempted bearing a child, but seed never took halt in her belly, as if the gods decided to withhold from her the joy of children. She fought, she prayed, all in hopes to intrigue them to reconsider their decision, and none answered her prayer—she had no god, nor goddess, to pray to, not one who would plant a child in her belly. And having no one to ask for aid or divine intervention, she threw herself off a cliff and into the vast depths of the sea.

Where gods were deaf, fish heard her prayers and grief. Her body, they could not save. But her soul they planted into the body of a fish giving birth to [Daga](http://the-king-of-novices.tumblr.com/post/105887755561/live-forever-or-die-trying-the-pantheon-4-10), half-fish half-human. When she ascended from human to god Daga swore to help out all those who seek aid with fertility, she vowed to allow no other woman to share her fate if she did not willingly want to deny herself children. To the pantheon she ascended as [Daga](http://the-king-of-novices.tumblr.com/post/105887755561/live-forever-or-die-trying-the-pantheon-4-10), the goddess of fertility and water—a woman who turned from human into god leaving her sister [Masekha](http://the-king-of-novices.tumblr.com/post/106253964456/live-forever-or-die-trying-the-pantheon-5-10) behind as a human warrior.

Leonardo’s eyes don’t rise to meet Ezio’s for a time. His face is melting into a passive quietude and Ezio watches a silence strutting about between them.

What he’s started has not been fairly harmless. He feels it has put him at a distance, yet he learned from Leonardo a number of things which make him wish to learn a good deal more. Ezio did try before to seduce wrong people, but he never paid for it over and over in this kind of suffering. What he suffers is reluctance.

Had Ezio been removed from ties to warriors, their ways of life, both past and present (since past inevitably seeps into the presence drip after drip), he would have found no qualms about approaching a man such as Leonardo without reservations. But years of expecting nothing but quick pleasures and short affairs lowered his expectations hopelessly, and he does not willingly seek to raise them. He has lived on this filthy imitation of love until his whole mind and body were compounded for inferior stuff, and he may be malnourished in such terms, but he has a lot to catch up on and Altaïr and Desmond weren’t much better off in their own affairs anyway. The fault lies not within Ezio’s refusal to settle, since those comrades who have settled found no measure of peace in their own marriages. The fault is not his. And so he is entitled to wanting certain things from this man, and discarding other possibilities.

Ezio advances a step forward before what little closeness he has managed to forge between them can flutter off into thin air, but Leonardo shows no inclination to meet him.

The groan of the wooden counter as result of Leonardo’s rising to sit-not-lean on it is an act of avoiding contact. It seems like it to Ezio.

“Is it only me you don’t like?” The warrior asks frankly in a voice cryptic.

“Not at all.” The way he says this, the narrowing of his eyes, the quick sigh he gives before shifting to change subjects, convinces Ezio that it would be a great relief for him to hear more of it before his sudden illusion is destroyed.

“Somehow I find it hard to believe that,” Ezio maintains, in a voice of hue that confuses the warrior himself. And before Ezio can utter something witty, or unwitty, Leonardo utters his next words in the most elaborate husk worthy of a seasoned seducer:

“What can I do to alter your mind then, hm?”

After Ezio’s _leap of faith_ —an expression borrowed and taken up by the masses on the market—Leonardo’s demeanor didn’t change abruptly, yet here-and-now, that stony face broke showing a glimpse of what’s beneath the mask. Ezio steps closer to attempt widening the cracks on it.

“I could think of something...” he whispers with an air of coy secrecy, and when he dares another step, when he’s near enough to perform this feat, he leans the heel of his palm against the counter, brazenly leaning this hand against the man’s clothed thigh, he doesn’t go further, nor does the man flinch from Ezio’s current enterprise.

“You’re sowing gapeseed, Ezio.”

Leonardo says this, but he pulls the side of his index finger from Ezio’s neck up to his chin in a slow, deliberate drag, and his words have no meaning, or too much of it. And then a thumb, warm and gentle, flattens down the edge of Ezio’s lip. Ezio can scent victory as he can scent the whiff of herbs on the man’s hand.

“To the contrary...” he husks, to graze the finger through the movement of lips before the touch is removed, “I’m sowing the seeds of gods.”

Ezio has his gift to Leonardo in mind, the Water Blossom wrapped at their feet, and whatever else he has in mind he alludes to without much explicitness, but a bold courage is grazing his back pushing him forwards, closer. Closer, until he is within a breath’s distance, close enough that he could map out the curious pattern of Leonardo’s pale freckles if he so wanted, if the man’s eyes weren’t arresting this attention elsewhere.

“Straighten your tongue and speak plainly,” Leonardo says in muted voice, without flushing the palest pink.

“One word, and I would be at your command.”

Leonardo’s mouth pulls up into a loop-sided smirk until it breaks to reveal his canine which causes Ezio to stare hungrily after his lips—a reaction which, perhaps, was expected as much as his words were.

“What advantage would I gain by association with a seducer of your caliber?”

Hopeless it is what his words imply, yet Ezio is gaining confidence and exploiting this appearance of confidence to summon his next words which never find their way out.

Altaïr stands half between outdoors and indoors, without pretense of sorrow at having interrupted them.

“Malik told me to come.”

A shadow of a word flits across Altaïr’s face but whatever apology was floating in his mind remains confined as Leonardo hops off the counter—having brushed Ezio aside—to guide the man inside.

Ezio’s expression wizens, dries up, until there’s only dissatisfaction and loathing at having been interrupted. Even if he now signaled to Altaïr to come at another time, it is doubtful that they could continue right from where they left off.

Ezio is capable of sharing his last crust with his friend. At present, though, he could physically haul Altaïr out of the room with no qualms.

Ezio’s decision to opt for retreat, however, doesn’t involve solely Altaïr. Had Leonardo wanted to continue what they’ve started, he wouldn’t have responded to Altaïr’s intrusion as well as he did, as well as he does still.

“I’ll come by tomorrow,” he promises himself.

Then he marches out in a somber mood and murky face. He sacks the wrapping of almonds Leonardo had bought for him earlier, and leaves.

 

* * *

 

Altaïr doesn’t know Leonardo. Altaïr doesn’t even know Malik as one should know his husband. Yet Altaïr cares for Malik, and Malik cares for Leonardo. Therefore, caring for Leonardo should bring Altaïr closer to Malik.

This looping line of logic weaves itself through Altaïr’s mind while the tailor busies himself with taking his measures, and for a long time he is basely tempted to hint at things familiar which may not be so familiar to this man jotting down numbers when he’s not prodding Altaïr with the measure tape.

Altaïr stands, extends, moves according to instructions, and for a while he does nothing but inwardly repeating again and again the advice he feels compelled to give before he leaves, even as a handsome youth toddles in from another room to ogle the naked display of Altaïr’s torso—something that neither bothers nor concerns him. Under pretense of learning measuring, the youth, curly-haired and mischievous, sits atop a counter swinging her gaze up-and-down Altaïr’s torso in tune with her swinging legs. The third presence is not a burden until words of advice accumulate on Altaïr’s tongue and he yearns to unleash them before long. With nothing else to ogle, though, the youth soon tires of her current pretense and leaves in pursuit of other ventures.

“You shouldn’t attach to Ezio, he is—“

“I know.”

Leonardo is measuring Altaïr’s shoulder slope and the warrior can look him in the eye. The tailor works, the gaze is not returned. It’s as if he’s said nothing. He _said_ nothing. He intended to say what would be a small loss to Ezio but large disaster to someone honest enough to attach to his friend. But this man seems to have known already what Altaïr has wasted thought on, and the folly of his stunted advice is becoming increasingly clear and increasingly embarrassing.

“My apologies if I’ve interrupted.”

Leonardo does look him in the eye now, with a smile that’s a little way off a cheerful smile.

“You interrupted nothing,” the tailor says switching to Altaïr’s neck, “The real question is, why do you speak against your friend?”

“I would die for Ezio,” Altaïr maintains vigorously, despite the pressure of measure tape against his neck, in the same conscientious fashion he would defend his loyalty to Desmond.

“The better question then is, why give advice to a man you dislike? Your impression of me had not been a good one.”

At this, Altaïr lowers his gaze to floor. The dismal tale of his second meeting with Malik is sufficient (and necessary, absolutely necessary) to remind him of slights of a not-so-distant past. It takes him a few moments—enough time for Leonardo to switch to another body part—but when he says it the words are strong and clear, clear to both receiver and speaker.

“I made wrong assumptions.”

Leonardo tightens the tape around the fullest part of his chest until the fit is snug, and Altaïr believes that the smile on the tailor’s lips will be his only answer and takes no quarrel with it.

“You admit your faults. It’s good,” Leonardo says with smile widened. He reads the tape and jots down one of his last measures. Encouraged, Altaïr intends to ask more, but the time of his required stay is running low and he is compelled to speak before properly mulling over his direction and words.

“He doesn’t seem to share your opinions,” Altaïr states in hope to extract more knowledge about his husband. Leonardo probably knows his intentions and he will reveal as much as he finds necessary, or nothing.

“That is correct. He is most stubborn. It’s in his origin.”

“What can I do to relieve myself of the tight clutch of his stubbornness?” Altaïr inquires more boldly, having realized that the tailor collected all data he needs. One advice before he goes. One, and it’s enough to get him started.

“Perhaps a gentle nudge to remind him of your good motives?”

“You speak in riddles,” Altaïr mourns, in an unobtrusive tone, and perhaps it’s his lack of violence that nudges Leonardo to remind himself that he may be helping Malik by giving Altaïr advice, however vague and formless to the warrior.

“Malik is most bark and ember. Give him breath and tinder until it ignites. You must find an ember of light in him and give it breath, and he will glow for you.”

This advice is not as ill-received as both have envisioned.

Instead of pondering what he could do, Altaïr takes the advice to heart and thinks of when Malik last ignited into an ember. Last night he had been warm and thawing. This morning even more so. And just earlier, by not refusing touch, he turned ember from bark. Altaïr can’t dismiss Leonardo’s advice by sheer fact that it proved true already. Altaïr’s duty, now, remains to better understand what breath he blew to ignite Malik. Was it his silence? His renouncing Al Mualim’s ways? Could it be his weakness that mellows Malik into rare-but-growing embers?

So lost in thought is the warrior that he barely notices the man fumbling through a nearby drawer. When he next looks at the man, he is offered a clay tin of salve, larger than the one he found on table this morning, with a smell more harsh than Malik’s soft-smelling one.

“He instructed me to give you this. For your hands,” Leonardo explains as he deposits the salve into Altaïr’s hand.

“He left one for me already,” Altaïr says with a flash of confusion.

“His own. But his hands are soft and cared for, as I’ve instructed him. This one is more suited for your needs.”

Altaïr offers a nod and takes it with no further word because Malik asked of Leonardo for a special salve, for him. That alone is enough to sting him into a warm, pleasant silence.

 

* * *

 

Altaïr’s climb up home is swift and filled with expectation.

Malik he has to leave behind at the water-well, having noticed that he’s not quite finished with his daily work despite the late hour, but he looks forward to filling his belly with promised food.

Altaïr’s midday meal is eaten at late evening.

He swerves from entrance right into the kitchen to locate mentioned fish, and his hunt is short-lived. In terms of arrangement, it’s much grander than Altaïr has imagined or a warrior would dare to hope.

Though not quite steaming, Altaïr finds his meal warm and served on a platter so extraordinarily decorated that he wonders whether this dish was produced from Malik’s secret chest of heirloom. He had promised not to lay a touch upon it. Yet Malik offers him no choice, and he takes his dinner from where he finds it.

On the plate is his sea bass. Two savoring fish scaled and gutted, a fresh catch of bass marinated and recently grilled. Beside the brushing of olive oil, the cavities of both fish have been filled in an attractive and patterned manner with lean slices of lemon, lime, and orange, and topped with a moderate seasoning of olive oil, garlic, and parsley, and at the center a grouping of two-three green and black olives.

Though garnished lavishly, in seasoning the meal was left poor, with pepper and salt as only spice. Malik has remembered that he is still getting his belly used to sharp and many spices.

Altaïr doubts the meal originally came with the garnish.

Malik may have gotten the grilled fish, but the rest was added on his own effort. In retrospect, Malik’s own meal had in all likelihood been anything but the copy of Altaïr’s current one. Malik’s must have been far poorer in terms of garnish and arrangement, if richer in spices. The effort his husband made riddles him. The riddle is too large to digest just yet and Altaïr takes this lavish treat with a precarious caution. His thankfulness is a matter undisputed, yet he doesn’t quite understand what he did to earn such kind treatment, whether it will last long, and how he should act to prolong Malik’s good will.

To balance the dishes out, Altaïr takes a regular cup to fill with wine, poor in ornament and quite a mismatch to his plate and cutlery.

He takes his cup and plate out to settle on table, he stops.

From the spot he’s made halt at, it’s no mystery what the thing atop their table is. It’s even less puzzling what the thing is when the tiny, swinging, limb is taken into consideration, but knowledge alone doesn’t dictate how Altaïr should behave in the presence of a baby inside his home.

He takes a seat. On the other end of the table is the cradle. And the tiny, tiny, angry fist swinging periodically above the wooden walls of the cradle. It’s best not disturbed. It’s best ignored.

Altaïr doesn’t even clear his throat—in fact, he makes as little noise as humanly possible—he doesn’t want to announce his presence to an infant he neither knows nor has interest to care for. Malik should be back soon. He will take care of it before that ex-warrior-now-guard woman crops up to pick up her child. Once she’s done tangling her sheets and making her wife scream. With this unwanted thought and unwanted company, Altaïr starts his meal.

He makes short business of removing the backbone and ribs from bottom fillet to transfer to the edge of plate, and digs into the firm white flesh. The fish is good and fits the tastes of someone raised in a seafood-loving population. Even if fish was not among his preferred food, the fact that the meal was prepared and served in a caring and loving way is enough to make it a feast. He is looking forward to finishing the couple of [Nokem](http://the-king-of-novices.tumblr.com/post/104486337526/live-forever-or-die-trying-the-pantheon-1-10)’s eyes that escaped his morning appetite—Malik has not touched them and Altaïr is bold enough to read it as no intention of doing so either. The next few minutes Altaïr spends alternating between silence and listening to an infant’s babble, silence and muffled sounds of community downstairs, silence and ignoring the baby’s existence.

A startling, bewildering shriek is what brutally yanks him out of trance.

The shriek collides into another one, until they meld together forging a squalling tangle of wailing, shrill and unpleasant and petrifying. The infant persists in this crying as if to announce the power of its set of lungs, and Altaïr stares at the cradle with a mouthful of fish, unsure what to do, and in all honesty, unsure whether he wants to do anything.

Malik is not there and Altaïr is confused.

To call Malik, to call someone, to do something, to proceed with meal, to react. Though neither his most-favored nor his wisest decision, he opts for the latter. He reaches out to touch the cradle with his index finger, but remembering the state of his unclean hands, he nudges the cradle into a gentle swing with his cleanest knuckle, it rocks to and fro, it fidgets from side to side, but it does not do much good.

The cradle rocks itself into a standstill, the baby wails, Altaïr stares on.

The screeching is disorderly and shrill and shredding at Altaïr’s insides, he has a cordial dislike for its sound. It stirs memories and it irritates him. It compels him to do something, anything, to bring it to a halt. No one is around.

He shifts along the bench.

There is no soul around, to take over or to tell him what to do. He leans over the cradle to peer inside it, and inside he finds the same bitty fingers soldered into tiny fists, the same pink-nosed infant full of verve and temper. No one is there to help him, and his instincts are taking over in an overwhelming flood of memories (earlier, brighter memories) he thought long-dead.

Altaïr has no useful garment to wipe hands on and he doesn’t intend to use the infant’s bedding for that purpose, so he finds the nearest rag. Once free from the shackles of his doubt, Altaïr leans over the cradle anew, and allowing instincts free reign, he scoops the infant up. They struggle against each other, a baby and a warrior equally alien to each other, but the child ceases its fretting and Altaïr draws it to his chest tighter, he can re-learn how to console, how to soothe through swaddling, through movement and rocking. Soon, the cries and their remnants are naught and there is babyish babble to match the gentle sway of Altaïr’s motion.

The infant grabs about Altaïr’s chest encountering no breast swollen with milk, and it takes up staring back at the warrior with large, inquisitive eyes and a delightful coo. Altaïr blinks and the hold turns briefly into a dull numb feeling, then a sharp pleasant ache that fits itself around him like new clothes, and he wears it well.

The next few moments of this nearly silent staring are so rapt with amusement, so pleasingly colored with hilarity, that the warrior bursts into a long-lived chuckle. There is a collection of babble and coos and toothles smiles and gummy grins that deepens Altaïr’s chuckle until it’s neither chuckle nor outright laughter, but semantics matter little because the warrior allows the scorching pleasantness of this newly-discovered or re-discovered sensation to settle snuggly into his chest and spread from there into every vein, every artery, every bone, until it has deadened all that’s cheerless and bleak in him, at least for this fleeting moment of childish fun.

Altaïr abandons the rest of his meal with no ill feeling to migrate to the sofa.

There is plentiful of pillows and more than enough space to settle the child down comfortably, but it remains fixed against Altaïr’s chest as he sinks into the pliant cushions of the left wedge of the sofa. It takes him a while to secure the infant in one arm but freeing his other one is his aim, and once he does it’s rather swiftly claimed by the child.

The warrior finds himself safely drifting out the sense of time as he relinquishes command of his fingers, and indeed the entire hand to the infant and its vigorous clasping of each and every of five digits it has at disposal. There is, occasionally, an angry sting from the determined clench on some finger, but no match for the serenity and peace that accosts Altaïr and then stays in his company.

The portion of his finger that’s not trapped in the grip of a tiny fist, the tip of this finger from mid-knuckle upwards, Altaïr slopes into a gentle fall down towards the first little obstacle, and at this gentle boop of his finger against the tip of the perky pink nose the chubby face scrunches up into a brief grimace before the infant launches a decided retaliation by clamping down onto Altaïr’s thumb. The very sight of this hurls him into another laugh-chuckle, one which lasts until there’s the opening of the door.

Altaïr is distantly aware that his features have been pinched into some expression that hasn’t visited his face for years, and his body is strangely full, but he’s been led astray to the extent that he forgot himself so entirely and so thoroughly that even as the door opens and his head responds to the sound by turning sideways, the expression isn’t swept away in the face of Malik’s shock.

He found his own gaze walking towards Malik’s astonished look with a smile of welcome, but in these few instants that follow he is suddenly too overwhelmed by the perfectly clear consciousness that he might have never greeted him in any such manner under less extraordinary circumstances.

Malik’s stately focus is on Altaïr’s handling of the baby.

He stands in a tight body posture, as if he just now stopped himself from leaping at Altaïr to take the infant from him. As if he thought Altaïr a threat and danger to the child. Until he’s eked out the last scraps of fear for the baby’s safety. Only then do his shoulders slump from their tensed hunch and he shuffles inside closing the door before laying his pail to a rest on the floor. By tacit consent, he allows Altaïr to look after the baby, not without occasional looks to ensure his husband is well-behaved during this tending to the child.

“What’s its name?” Altaïr asks to sate curiosity.

“Talia,” Malik says dully, still wary, still vigilant.

“A girl,” the warrior smiles at the infant, and he’s not insulted in any way as, suddenly—though not unexpectedly, as Altaïr’s has been tugging at Talia’s tiny crochet cap to pull it into proper place and has thereby exposed his fingers to her grabby greed—she fastens her soft, plump little fingers around one parched, big one of Altaïr’s, and it’s not until she starts pulling his finger towards her yawning mouth that he first denies her a craving. With the pacifier removed from her grasp, Talia launches into her next array of high-pitched shrieks.

It’s almost a pleasure for Malik to see how Altaïr meets this intrusion.

The man’s face falls slack, astonished rather than offended, as if he’s realized that his own action and denial caused this outburst. Malik is peaceably ignoring the urge to burst himself, into a most delightful laughter, but Altaïr’s confused, confounded visage turns to meet him and Malik compliments himself for resisting the itch to laugh before it battered his resistance entirely.

“She’s hungry,” Malik explains curtly. He doesn’t trust his voice at present.

The hearth has long been snuffed out and Malik has no fire at the ready except the one readily available downstairs in the boil-room, but a small flame is all he needs. He lights his double-nozzled lamp to put on table, and for a handful of moments Altaïr is raided by confusion, unsure whether Malik will instruct him on how to feed the girl and what with, until he realizes that Malik is not merely bringing light to a dimmed room, but actually warming the milk.

Malik holds the small vessel above the flame, and a small, wooden spoon at the ready.

The cries thunder steadily despite Altaïr’s best efforts to console the child.

“Put her down and prop her up with a pillow, you will spoon-feed her,” Malik instructs as he gives the milk a stir.

Altaïr obeys. His construction is far more ambitious than Malik had required or expected, but it’s better than he himself had managed before and he maintains silence. And while the warrior is kneeling on the carpet with front thighs lined up against the sofa-side and elbows settled snugly on the seat cushion, Talia is burrowed between his forearms in this pillow fort of at least four-five pillows, constructed in such a disciplined form that Malik has no doubts about the origin spark of such a pillow construction.

He entrusts the clay vessel and the spoon into his husband’s hold but remains to monitor his spoon-feeding skills to ensure Altaïr won’t later be beheaded by Mary herself. For a man Malik considered an uncouth brute fresh out of war, Altaïr handles infants well, with a kind of practiced dexterity that takes time to grow roots. It’s as if the man’s rust is flaking off with each moment spent with Talia, and little more than that. It’s as if the mere act of caring for someone is balming the warrior’s many wounds, gilding the spots where rust has chipped off and peeled away.

The first spoon Altaïr has to nudge against Talia’s mouth until the soft curve of the spoon sits gently on the infant’s lower lip, but the following succession of spoonfuls is accepted with eagerness. Altaïr had practice with feeding infants and it shows. It rankles Malik and gnaws at him while they kneel there, two men leaning over a baby propped by a pillow and surrounded by a handful more, one tilting spoon after spoon into a toothless-munching-smacking mouth and the other watching this procedure until curiosity expands too large to cram back into his mind.

“It didn’t look the other day like you knew how to hold a child,” Malik says lowly as he averts his gaze, referring to the other day in the courtyard when Talia burst into a cry.

“I grew up in the orphanage.”

His words Altaïr says without latching on the inherent sadness of this statement. A shadow of a smile pulls at his lips, unattached to memory, unattached, perhaps, to Malik’s presence as well. He is scooping up from Talia’s chin a couple of drops that have escaped, and for a moment of time, Altaïr cheats life. The unsightly, revolting side of it. Until Malik prods deeper to remind him.

“You have no family?”

“None.” _Not even you_.

Altaïr collects another spoonful of milk. He expects nothing and he gets nothing.

Malik lifts himself to return to spreading clothes offering as tacit excuse the work habit in his bones, not the escape that it is. Altaïr expects no more from him, but he accepts it without the dismal hopelessness that paralyzed him before. He is already awed by the ease with which they’ve drifted through conversation, but to discuss among themselves with absolute frankness their problems of marital maladjustment had not been on his list of expectations.

He throws the issue of his marriage to oblivion for a moment, allows another delighted coo to stomp the issue to ground at present.

What’s for many people an unenviable job is proving to be a great source of fun for the warrior. The long, busy silence that settles in the room is interspersed with wet munching, and smiles, and varying patterns of coos and Talia's little _neh_ s between spoons. Altaïr is forgetting himself again in this caring for a little being that makes him feel large at heart, and large at contributing to community. A man with a refined, worn face, and, curiously enough, quite fashionably dressed in softness. So engrossed is he in his current doting and the feeling of his little finger clasped by bitty fingers that his impromptu lullaby is no business of pre-planning. Malik listens to his voice while it’s yet a whispery babe growing into something stronger, until it begins to quaver out some brutish and bloody warrior’s song, not untunefully.

Malik’s eyes make another dash for Altaïr’s face, his chest is restless.

Spreading the clothes to dry is a routine which requires no attendance of his eyes and he is free to keep a vigil watch of this thrilling and soothing sight. And while his husband is sunken into the seating cushions feeding Talia and cooing nonsense and gibberish when he’s not attempting to catch another tune of an imagined song, Malik is blindly spreading clothes across his drying rack as an alien flood of happiness foams and rises behind the invisible barrier that is to burst open any moment now. He spies on them until he’s entranced by no choosing of his own, and too slow to catch sight of the barren state of the clay vessel and Altaïr returning his gaze.

Before Malik can shake himself free of the soporific effect of the sight or the imprint it left on him, Altaïr reads it from his face.

“It lifts heart to see you smile,” Altaïr remarks with a complete lack of clumsiness or constraint. Nothing is untrue about Altaïr’s words and that makes Malik look away. Even by toying with aloofness Malik can’t rectify the lapse he’s made, and it’s doubtful that Altaïr will address his lack of response but he feels obliged to answer with something other than detached blandness. As Altaïr shifts scooping Talia up to set her against his chest again, Malik parts his mouth to offer something more than his quiet ways of today, but it’s not meant to be uttered.

Mary barges in with a casual ease and for the blink of a moment a panic so all-consuming and singular holds Malik anchored to the spot before he bolts to halt Mary from drawing blade, the impetus carries him across the distance and in such a way that he nearly bumps into her upon reaching her armed side. She sidesteps easily, putting a hand up between them without removing her stare from the sight of Altaïr with her babe in arm and this renders Malik immobile.

He retreats a step feeling he has bungled it badly by allowing Altaïr care over Talia.

“Mary—“

“ _Shht_.”

Malik pictures to himself what he would have said to her had she let him speak. He doesn’t recognize fury on her face, thank gods, he doesn’t.

He remains rooted to the spot as Mary saunters off to seat herself into the sofa, away from Altaïr but well in sight. Altaïr, too, follows this silent journey inspecting his inspector.

For a moment they stare at each other, a man with someone else’s child in arms and a sharp-faced scarlet-lipped guard fresh out of her wife’s sheets, and silence persists, and Malik returns to work. Malik’s hands work habitually, sans his guard or intervention, but in his head he is tossing thoughts of possibilities as he is tossing his gaze between the two silent parties in growing worry.

Most of the silence they frankly idle.

Mary dipped into a hollow of pillows with arms crossed as if supervising Altaïr’s quality of work, and Altaïr engrossed into the baby equally recessed into the cushions of the neighboring wedge of the sofa.

He sees Altaïr gazing up at Mary almost furtively but without intention to give her the child. He sits with an arm wound defensively around Talia rocking the swaddled infant in a repetitive waggle against his chest and other hand at the child’s command as a pacifier. There is more strength in her than is common to babies, yet the warrior offers not a scrap of protest as she kneads at his fidgeting fingers as if there is something appallingly fascinating in the glaring dissimilarity between their hands—a chubby soft and a hardened parchedness.

Altaïr established himself there and he is reluctant to give up hold on Talia, and Talia is reluctant to swap arms that hold her, and Mary makes no effort to wrestle her from Altaïr’s embrace. Her harsh stare melts away until she’s regarding Altaïr not much different from how she would regard a pair of underwear or inspect a pair of trousers. She calmly lolls herself further back into the bulk of cushions and gives herself the bliss of drawing up her ankle onto her knee in a near-crossing of legs.

Malik doesn’t know if she would have approved his decision to allow Altaïr care over Talia, but blades have not been drawn, blood has not been spilled, curses have not been traded, and whatever dissatisfaction Mary might harbor she will forgive.

“I hate to disturb your freshly-minted love,” Mary tells the warrior without specifying the other party and he can’t escape a brief ponder whether she meant Talia or Malik, “but I need to take her back now.”

“It’s nice, having a family,” he says and looks at his own words with a mixture of longing and hatred.

“You’ve abandoned your own.”

“ _Mary_ —“

“ _Shht_.”

“Mary, really—“ Malik cracks another try.

She quells him with one look.

“I’m having words with your husband, you’ve no part in this conversation.” With that, she returns her measuring, calculating, gauging gaze to Altaïr.

Malik is more annoyed than hurt at this exclusion and disregard for his wishes. He frowns to himself and glares at the clothes he’s spreading, but he is chained, with no right to intervene in a conversation he’s not invited to.

“You’ve made a mistake,” he hears Altaïr say, “I couldn’t have abandoned a family if I never had one. I had a community, at the orphanage, not here. I’m not accepted as part of this one. And had you left to fulfill your duty, you wouldn’t be either.”

Malik snaps up to regard her.

In him, there is a confusion of feelings that fight to break the surface, most persistent among them fresh fear. Mary might well attack Altaïr—verbally if not physically—at the implied insult offered to her person. Whatever Altaïr’s source of information was, he is correct in assuming that Mary was once a warrior like himself. Mary never considered herself a deserter for shedding her armor in the wake of war preparations. Malik doesn’t know how she will react to being named so.

Mary gives no sign of having received the insult personally. Her face is that of a person who only recently sacrificed to [Daga](http://the-king-of-novices.tumblr.com/post/105887755561/live-forever-or-die-trying-the-pantheon-4-10), her expression stretched lax and soft in the aftermaths of good sex. When she speaks, whatever reproach she is about to offer is not in the tone of her voice, but in the content of her message.

“My duty was to protect my family. My community. Your duty was to protect that which works to overthrow it.”

Altaïr opens his mouth in urgent attempt to object, but in this race, he is second.

“Now tell me, soldier, what did I abandon? I left my trade, to protect my family. You protected your honored trade, and left your family. And you dare call me a deserter now. What do _you_ have? Where is your family you so vehemently protected?”

Talia is tugging at his thumb vigorously, but his body is still, deadened. He faces a blank, resourceless mind, he thinks a lot but little of it stays in his mind, except for the sense of poverty that invades him and will deepen when she takes the infant from him as warriors have been taken from him, as his husband was taken from him as soon as he met him again.

“Was it worth it, soldier? Was your ideal worth leaving a child behind? To labor for years with no money and no protection?”

Mary doesn’t hope for much in terms of impact. She imagines her words as pebbles—they will graze the surface of the lake when flung, they will upset it for a moment of time, and the water will return to its old ways as if nothing happened.

She collects herself from the sofa, then steps in front of the warrior expecting the child to be entrusted into her arms. Altaïr lifts the infant from the warmth of his chest cheated of many things. He feels compelled to look up at Mary as she imparts her next sting of words, but something is keeping his gaze on the carpet, he consoles himself thinking how brave he has been not to venture a look up.

“I am grateful that you cared for my child, soldier. You be grateful I haven’t opened your stomach for grieving my other child.”

Altaïr feels a pressure of unspilled tears.

Mary shifts the weight of her child into one arm and strolls over to her other child in an unhurried pace. The gentle, persuasive pull on his nape Malik accepts unquestioningly, the smack of a kiss on his forehead he accepts in silence, the overly familiar tug on the soft of his earlobe he accepts with fondness.

The door is closed in her wake, the blanket of quiet spread between them like Malik’s laundry. With no wits left, Malik lifts his pail from the floor to put away for tomorrow, and he expects nothing as Altaïr wistfully clears his throat all of a sudden.

“I know that I’ve made many mistakes, both before and after becoming your husband,” Altaïr says from the sofa unsure how Malik will accept it, or if he will accept it at all, “but I intend to rectify them presently.”

Malik mulls over this overdue apology, reflects on its implications.

He considers flaunting his discontent, but there’s no discontent to be flaunted.

 

* * *

 

They prepare for bed out of sync, for Malik uses the business of removing the imprint of Mary’s lip paint from his forehead to avoid disrobing in time with Altaïr.

They pray together, to separate gods.

Altaïr prays without sand and Malik without song. Altaïr never heard him offer song in worship of [Nokem](http://the-king-of-novices.tumblr.com/post/104486337526/live-forever-or-die-trying-the-pantheon-1-10), although he’s sure nobles will do so on occasion. Altaïr prays longer, to substitute for the lack of sand libation for [Hiba](http://the-king-of-novices.tumblr.com/post/105028879746/live-forever-or-die-trying-the-pantheon-3-10), but Malik remains until the last of Altaïr’s prayer expires, less for keeping his husband company than lacking the cheek to go before worship of Hiba is finished.

“Have you put balm on your hands?” Malik breaks the silence after their rise to feet.

“Yes,” Altaïr remembers the strong smell of the creamy substance and the relief it brought, “Thank you.”

“What for?” Malik mutters at last.

“For caring for me.”

A frown begins stamping across Malik’s confused face creating in the process an even messier confusion, “I’m not caring for you, you’re caring for yourself.”

Malik’s tone is so sincere in its confusion that Altaïr can’t but think him unskilled at accepting gratitude. It’s as if he has removed himself from this chain of care by the mere fact that the salve was crafted by Leonardo. He selfishly or unselfishly excluded himself from the affair as if it slipped his mind that he noticed the state of Altaïr’s hands, that it moved him enough to leave him his own salve as first relief, or that he cared enough to ask Leonardo for a better one, or that he felt concern enough to inquire. What is more, Malik seems to renounce gratitude for something he feels he has no part in out of sheer sense of self-sufficiency and self-care that are so quintessentially _Malik_ that he can’t find strength in him to argue against his flawed logic.

Altaïr had abandoned a child and left it to raise itself. In essence, it was no different from leaving a child with sword in untrained hand to fend for itself. And yet, after years of absence, the culprit that dumped the weapon to a defenseless child came seeking to disarm a strong young man, a warrior who imposed himself in the cozy nest of another claiming somebody else’s laurels to decorate his own head. Malik has had every right to call him a brute.

“I admire you,” Altaïr stabs out of blue giving their mutual silence a slight shake.

Across him, on the other side of bed, Malik, too, is preparing to lie down.

“What prompts such confession?”

“You stand as [Nokem](http://the-king-of-novices.tumblr.com/post/104486337526/live-forever-or-die-trying-the-pantheon-1-10) defeating Ga’ash with your bare hands. Without [Gdila](http://the-king-of-novices.tumblr.com/post/104486350666/live-forever-or-die-trying-the-pantheon-2-10).”

Malik considers this confession that seems neither over-embroidered nor untrue. Words are stinging him on the lip.

“I didn’t start from nothing,” Malik admits at last, when the passage from heart to mouth is not as arduous and admits words outside, “You gave me shelter and coin. A debt not soon forgotten.”

“There’s no balance between us. Remaining loyal paid the balance of your debt to me.”

Malik offers no reply, not even a nod. But the silence is unwinding from something that had felt oppressive into floating between them more amiably.

Malik puts out the lamp and wraps himself into the coziness of his clean bed, and Altaïr crawls under the sheets from his side (the one he unwittingly stole from Malik) with breeches on, unlike his other nights where he slept without them, perhaps foolishly. Probably foolishly.

Altaïr is expecting something. Some grander resolve or warmer acceptance, yet as he follows Malik’s nestling into the quilt and sheets, nothing indicates that Malik will turn around to face him tonight. Malik knows nothing of the horrors Altaïr faced last night and witnessed today, and Altaïr seeks to spare him this knowledge. He would not speak of it, yet without the intervention of his husband he might well fall prey to nightmares and ill sleep that have plagued him before. He doesn’t want to beg. Not for fear of appearing weak, but out of concern for Malik’s reaction.

Malik knows nothing of the death the other inhabitant of this bed has faced. Behind his back, the stuttered breath is not the sigh of a warrior but that of a man wounded.

“Are you employed?” _Do you still work for him?_

Malik’s whisper is a spindly, frail thing, but Altaïr’s ears pick it up with a gusto, and he shuffles along the matters, a breath closer to him.

“No.” _I don’t work for Al Mualim any longer_. “I’ll seek other employment.”

It doesn’t seem like Malik will attempt another break of silence and Altaïr feels compelled to act on his own now, having been stabbed into action through Malik’s own initiative. Malik is wrapped up to his neck into his portion of the quilt, and so Altaïr slightly lifts the outer edge of the imprisoned sheet beneath and crawls along the matters until there is a pang of conserved warmth, and then swerves upwards to tap gently against Malik’s nape.

Malik rolls back his shoulder to glance over it but to regard Altaïr’s face properly rolling onto his back is inevitable.

“Malik... would it trouble you to hold hands again tonight?”

Even with Altaïr’s husky-voiced plea, Malik is almost tempted to give an excuse and restore himself to his previous position, but he is immured by that single needy look that permeates Altaïr’s features. Malik eyes up and down his fallen face that yearns over the hand, and this expression alone promptly confiscates Malik’s reluctance.

Altaïr has a strange way of talking when he’s vulnerable to decisions of others, yet very lucid and expressive.

There is a horrible hot reek of sympathy, so beastly that at first Malik tries to breathe in small shallow puffs to not fill his lungs with it to the bottom to avoid bathing the man with care he is asking for. But holding hands is a familiar bargain and he accepts it with more ease than he did yesterday night.

The man across him doesn’t work for the murderer of his family but he remains loyal as before. Altaïr’s ignorance is limitless and appalling. But around him is not the unspeakably repellent stench of arrogance but the milder scent of humility, and Malik is not as revolted as before.

This time, when he swaps sides and rolls over, he pulls himself across mattress to shift closer in accord with Altaïr’s tug on his offered hand. It’s only a sliver, it’s not much. Yet he lies now on the center of the bed, on the border that divided them before.

He is lying on his side-binds again—a clear mark that his decision to have Leonardo make him nightclothes with knots on the side he usually doesn’t sleep on was unwise—he will have to wear his old nightclothes again if Altaïr persists in arresting his hands overnight.

The man is inclined to speak again.

“If I could feel but a pale shadow of the affection you feel for your late family, it would lay my heart to rest and my mind to peace...” Altaïr utters in a more benign tone than ever.

Malik waits until the warm rush of Altaïr’s whisper and its aftermaths are gone from his face, then he entrusts his remaining hand into Altaïr’s hold where it’s taken up with the utmost care and drawn up to Altaïr’s lips.

Of Malik’s answer, there is no trace.

He leaves his hands in Altaïr’s guard and soon succumbs to sleep he has lost last night.

He is not yet ready, or willing, to open up to him. In retrospection, it’s a product of a blunder Altaïr had made, a piece of rudeness he had allowed himself, a threat of no consent he had chosen to ignore.

But Malik’s hands are given without self-hatred and it underscores the importance of this gesture. He may not open up soon, or ever, and Altaïr’s fanciful reverie of a family may well be an illusion fostered to endure longer.

But there is such a damp dizzy warmth that spreads from his arms up, in spite of this or that well-known honesty, that consoles him through knowledge that his imagination might never be quite real, and he is grateful for it.

Malik may not open up, but he will keep him.

Better unhappy with him than happy without him.

 

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> The child Anne Bonny lost in AC IV: Black Flag and recovered in this story is a willful little girl named Talia whose beautiful name was chosen by my dear [mrasayf](http://mrasayf.tumblr.com/). Considering her two mothers ~~and her two Syrian uncles~~ , the girl will grow into an overkill you don’t mess with.
> 
> The [beautiful shell bowl](http://i01.i.aliimg.com/photo/v0/111859969/shell_bowl_crafts_with_silver_art.jpg) we'll see again was an idea by [opallight](http://opallight.tumblr.com).


	7. Note

Hello, guys.

 

I've abandoned writing altogether, but despite this sad fact I thought I might return to add a little note here saying that I can answer any questions related to the plot of this story, if anyone should have them.

Before, I had in mind laying out the entire plot and either posting it here as one chapter or posting it on my blog, but I think just answering any questions that anyone might have is easier, so if anyone is still reading this and wants to know how something ends or how some relationship goes, or any other questions, I can answer them here in the comments to sate your curiosity.

 

Thanks to all who participated in this unfinished story, to those who read, to those who contributed to it, to those who made their own creations based on the story, and I'm truly sorry the story was such a disappointment.

 

**EDIT: I'm back to writing.**

**Certain things happened in my private life which were completely unexpected, and even though I overcame them, my genuine desire for writing returned after that, which was a completely unexpected turn. But I'm glad.**

**Even though I said it already, I want to repeat that I'm grateful for the support people have offered and I thank you all.** **Welcome back.**


	8. Chapter 7 - Part I

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> A huge thanks to [opallight](http://opallight.tumblr.com) who still finds her way inside this story and who helped me steer Sheker's festival to the right direction.
> 
> Another huge thanks to all of you who are still here, still patient, still with me.

 

“You find a place at my side at last.”

Where this jab at Desmond’s chasing after her at Al Mualim’s reception would have been more befitting on their first meeting, it stands out as a wizened attempt at jest now as Desmond stands before her, on the same spot.

Indifference sits perfectly straight on Desmond’s face, on what little of it Lucy can glimpse at through the shadows of his hood. She blames its presence on the chill of the breaking dawn that's nipping her own skin where she's left it exposed.

“Apologies,” the warrior speaks at length, “My presence was commanded.”

Desmond is no jokes and silence and no sympathy today.

They are two different worlds. Noble and commoner. Commander and follower. Lucy used to see in him a floating man, the kind that is unfortunate to cooperate with. She didn’t like Altaïr all that much, nor did she harbor much hope for tying a man like that into an allegiance—he seemed too bullheaded to her where Ezio seemed a lost cause. Desmond is easy to manipulate, that was what she had thought, before she got a glance at his full potential. Tying his allegiance to her now is of utmost importance.

“I came following the stench of death,” he says.

At his words—this time more charged with emotion (however subtle)—Lucy huffs a hint of a smirk, yet Desmond finds it severely lacking in humor. There is some sense of atonement in the fact that she doesn’t deny her involvement in the massacre of priests, secondary as it may have been.

“Like [Zikaron](http://the-king-of-novices.tumblr.com/post/119950551366/god-zikaron-patron-of-death-prophecies) then,” she says glibly.

Desmond wears armor, except for the helmet. The helmet he's replaced with hood as deep as his silence. She can barely catch his face.

Like [Zikaron](http://the-king-of-novices.tumblr.com/post/119950551366/god-zikaron-patron-of-death-prophecies), indeed. The faceless one. The one whose face no one has ever seen, one who arrived on the island following after the stench of death in the wake of two murders. That of a god, and that of humans. He, the god of death, who hides his face in the depths of his hood and follows after mortal humans ever so fascinated by [Nokem](http://the-king-of-novices.tumblr.com/post/104486337526/live-forever-or-die-trying-the-pantheon-1-10)’s children. Zikaron, who came summoned by [Hiba](http://the-king-of-novices.tumblr.com/post/105028879746/live-forever-or-die-trying-the-pantheon-3-10)’s death but stayed for the curious creatures that another god created. For humans die and where mortal beings dwell—death is sure to follow.

“Zikaron did come after the stench of murder, but he remained to guide humans. To give prophecies and make ties to other gods.”

“Death delivered you to my side. Is that not a form of prophecy fulfilled?”

Desmond knows there are no prophecies other than those which exist already. The god of death once promised that he will only ever deliver three prophecies. First to [Nokem](http://the-king-of-novices.tumblr.com/post/104486337526/live-forever-or-die-trying-the-pantheon-1-10), second to Ga’ash, the last one to humanity. There exist no other prophecies but those that have already been revealed. Accordingly, Desmond does not fall for that trap.

“You think yourself Sheker?” He questions instead.

“It’s a matter of metaphor. Do they not have a kindred bond? She a storyteller and he a deliverer of stories and missives. Was she not the only one to see his face?” Lucy’s patience is restlessly pacing the space between them, she takes a step forward and there is a genuine flourish in her movement and a brave countenance on her face when she grasps at the base of his hood to pull it back.

Had Desmond’s eyes not seen wagons full of massacre, had the reek of blood not been in his nostrils even now, he might have accepted this sentimental treacle. His cold reception is a sudden thorn in her side. With grim satisfaction he watches as she retreats, her expectations dimmed. He doesn’t pull his hood up.

“I have nothing of worth for your cause,” he says.

“I seek only words.”

His hood is off but Lucy wishes, with a sense of futility, that he could abandon the void on his face in the same way he abandoned the lonely stuffiness of his hood. He doesn’t, he chooses through gross liberty to show that he does not care, even if this decision sticks in his throat a little.

“Before, I’ve asked you to keep your eyes and ears open for me. Now I require you to not reveal what you've seen," Lucy tells him.

“You ask me to speak with false tongue.”

“It will be revealed only if your lips part and your tongue unfurls. I ask that you keep your tongue obedient.”

Desmond dots his face expression with some contempt. She seeks to control him yet she is the one being controlled. She stands before him with a leash for him at the ready, yet she fails to recognize the leash tugging at her own neck.

“Even if I give such promise, my comrades and I don’t speak with the same voice—“

“If they protest then cut out their tongue.”

Desmond is self-possessed enough to laugh his response little above a whisper instead of bursting with laughter.

Lucy quells him with one look, “You think I’m joking?”

She stirs on her spot, not making to move actually, but with just a glance beyond Desmond’s shoulder, as though half suggesting the idea of departure. There is no health in her commands and he doesn’t intend to follow them, but he settles down for the mere fact that she intended to say more and should he prompt her to leave now he may be receiving another order to report before long.

He pulls his hood up and pelts her with indifference, but he doesn’t budge from his spot.

“Your armor and weapons,” Lucy says pointing spiritlessly at the sword strapped to his side, “You are to turn it in without delay. Today, if you are able.”

To turn in their armor. To surrender the sword they have carried for years. To abandon their profession as if it’s no different than changing your clothes.

“And the rest of warriors that are unaware of your schemes?”

“They will soon follow the example.”

Rejection and hurt pad slowly onto Desmond’s face and sit there as a ragged, dwarfish couple who ply themselves with subtlety—not subtly enough, though, to conceal it from this woman’s prying eyes. She sees; he is half-drunk with anger and half-starved for comfort. He hopes she won’t stab him again and though it’s not her intention, she does stab him anyway.

“I’m not ungrateful,” she says winding her arm behind her back to unstrap what is a leather pouch, “I offer reward where well-deserved.”

By _well-deserved_ she no doubt implies Desmond’s giving her leeway to issue an order she previously had no excuse to issue, to order the massacred priests buried instead of thrown to sea. Such a rich crops of deductions she’s made. Desmond did what he had to for the sake of his community, not to keep her good conscience intact. Still, he says nothing as she blindly unstraps another pouch to hold it up before him as offering.

The additional pouch she’s produced is large, the first one considerably smaller in comparison. Both rattle with what is unquestionably a bagful of coin.

“I relieve you of my presence, but I wish to reward you for what you did. Take whichever of these you think appropriate. Take both, if you so wish.”

She gives a sharp tug for emphasis’ sake and there is a chink of coins as the rewards dangle before him.

Lucy had no intention of humiliating him. So in fairness, he ought to have been grateful—still, he is not. She wants to present herself in a kind light, but she has done it in the most offensive manner hoping to extort Desmond’s gratitude through coin and buy his allegiance.

The warrior reconnoiters her face, her sleek blond hair, until he is stuffed to the eyes with her young and fresh cheeks, her fragile and eager excitement, her lips—red and wet, like cherries.

One coin pouch is smaller than the other, to give him freedom of choice.

He revels in the pedantry of this arrangement and he revels in the reward he will take.

To Lucy’s astonishment, he seizes her by the hand that holds the heavier pouch, by the wrist, he sweeps it off his path to raid her temporary confusion and bends to sack a kiss.

She doesn’t flinch.

His lips are warm, the rest is cold. He pulls back just as he begins to settle into the kiss and the look that follows his retreat is singularly unreal, as if she expects more of what she hasn’t expected. Without delving into the essence of what he’s just done (it’s so tricky and obscure, so utterly useless for practical purpose) she asks:

“Of all rewards, you take this?”

On the horizon to Desmond’s left, the sun keeps swelling only to be concealed by a gust of clouds.

“With no due respect, what I took is worth least. For what little I did, I didn’t deserve more than that.”

There’s a moment of silence, then rage half-staggers half-dances up onto her face, and the sole gleam of sense that he has offended her with his words as she has offended him with her offer gives him satisfaction but fills a hollow inside him with cold where it should have been warmed by the kiss.

Anger pinches her face before she pins a sharp slap to his cheek unfailingly, with a superiority in technique that is acquired either through fury or through experience. The smack of her slap reaches him far before the clatter of coins that spill from the pouch she’s released from grasp in order to cuff him.

The cheek that stings sharply sobers him up and he turns his face to look at what he left in the wake of his insult. Lucy is not a very good actor when she gives way to emotion. Neither is he. He inspects her as blandly as before, he regards her surly face, and he can’t move himself to anger.

For before him is a woman that stands in the shadow of her own whip.

 

* * *

 

Malik wakes to the tugging at his hand and finds Altaïr frantically looking for what’s never evaded his touch to begin with.

That Altaïr tugged at his hand has not been a conscious action, but rather the result of a sentiment quite like that from yesterday morning when Malik had been awake, one that Malik is doubtful Altaïr has grasped the inner meaning of, one that Malik took especial pride in puzzling out since it gave him the pleasure of getting something for nothing. Malik is not the one who requires a hand to hold; yet Altaïr can’t seem to part from the luxury of this comfort anymore.

Malik finds his focus first, only to have his gaze collide with Altaïr’s naked torso which begins rather impressively with that devastating cut in muscles on his lower abdomen Malik covertly envies, ladders of ribs overrun by muscle, and chiseled chest, but ends, somewhat disappointingly, with an infantile panic on the comely face of a mature man.

Malik ignores Altaïr’s tight clasp on his hand by dint of amusement in finding his husband with such a frail-looking expression over something as simple as holding hands, but once assured that Malik’s hand has not slipped from his grasp overnight and that the hand won’t be pulled from his grasp, Altaïr draws it up to his mouth with an innocent-eyed look to lay a kiss across his knuckles.

His lips are warm as before, only his face is home to more stubble now.

He hasn’t thrashed about in sleep tonight, or Malik had been too out of it to even notice.

Malik gives him a good-natured moment more to part with his hand and only then does he roll over facing away, to examine the weather through his secret corner. Where he has hoped to find a sun-dazzled window and [Hiba](http://the-king-of-novices.tumblr.com/post/105028879746/live-forever-or-die-trying-the-pantheon-3-10)’s eye piercing the blue morning mist like yesterday, he finds the barrel-curves of the awning above with suspended raindrops running along them.

In the distance, the summit of Hiba’s hill is veiled in fog.

Mountaintops are cuddling with clouds.

Malik rises from bed puzzled by the wild temperature swings and he blames it on Sheker. Her winds must have been confused by love to give them such warm weather this deep into the cold season before they turned chilly again. Behind, Altaïr is rising from bed as well. Malik orders rather than asks him to make the bed (which Altaïr accepts without a hint of a whine) and returns with supplies to redress the injury on Altaïr’s palm—a drab piece of work conducted in silence and without much pomp.

 

* * *

 

“We may be having the festival tonight,” Malik says as he dots the fish with butter.

Altaïr looks up from the loaf of bread he’s been slathering with peach jam to find Malik engrossed in his own breakfast. What surprises him is not the language itself but the method of speaking it. It’s as if this ordinary event of eating together has to Malik ceased to be a burden endured and grew into a shared meal under the spell of some cozy muteness peppered with tidbits of even more ordinary conversation. Commotion is no beloved of Altaïr (though he’s been told that _he_ is beloved of commotion), and the ceasefire between them soaks him in pleasant silence. He says nothing, and to his utmost surprise, this not what Malik wants.

“Has the custom slipped your mind or need I remind you?”

Both answers would put Altaïr on a pedestal of ignorance. Altaïr cares for making his husband happy, but he’s unwilling to participate in what is a jest at his own expense.

“I know what Sheker’s festival is. We performed it abroad,” the warrior reveals and the dark in his voice is quite evident. Malik has to retrieve this stab unsure whether he left a gash or not. Malik’s annoyance with him is irrational but very real, his attitude almost seems to depend on what Nokem whispers into his ear. His resentment still has teeth.

Malik perhaps might wickedly assail him with more little stabs and dash off his own opinions in the coarsest fashion, but Malik turns to his own meal and leaves it at that, as if acquainted with the fact that to Altaïr the war is an old wound that lingers still.

Years of matrimony and they know nothing of their marriage. Altaïr has been married now for seven years and is much too afraid or too proud to speak of the past, and Malik has been married for four years and feels too unqualified to listen to what he has to say of the war.

Malik doesn’t linger on this exchange and unobtrusively goes on with his breakfast. This alone quite does away with any ill-feeling that might have crept into their conversation.

Altaïr sees the crown of Malik’s glossy dark head and the downcast face of the young husband sitting opposite him. It appears to him that he never departs from a certain fixed tone when describing his husband in his head (he has never departed from it, even when imagination served as substitute for the real thing), however disappointed or angry or off the course he had wanted to travel.

Altaïr is overly familiar with the festival for Sheker and its dragon puppets.

Altaïr had on his way to Al Mualim’s quarters seen the hay carts lined along the cattle forum on Sheker’s market, assembled as kindling for the great pyre. Sheker’s festival is one of the few public rites they had been allowed to perform abroad and Altaïr personally participated in the making of all seven dragon puppets. The essence of this ritual is enduring despite changeable backdrops, and it relies solely on the weather.

Once summer swaps place with winter and days begin to turn colder, the priests mark the first auspicious cold day as the day of the festival, though the preparations thereof begin even before the first chill arrives to the city. Other than music and storytelling and dance as unalienable parts of the festival, at dusk a gargantuan pyre is ignited at the cattle market during this vast social gathering.

The pyre has a singular purpose. It serves as place of destruction-and-rebirth.

It is believed that all storms on land (as opposed to all storms on sea which are the bidding of [Daga](http://the-king-of-novices.tumblr.com/post/105887755561/live-forever-or-die-trying-the-pantheon-4-10)) are caused by Sheker and therefore puppets crafted in her likeness are burned so that the cold season passes swiftly. People throw dragon puppets into the pyre to destroy them. There are as many puppets as there are communities on the island; every community crafts one dragon puppet for this event, and each member of a community participates in the making of it.

As for the shape of the puppet, its dragon likeness stems from Sheker herself, for she used to be a scarlet dragon while her loyalty was yet tied to Ga’ash, while her winds were yet cold and harsh. To disentangle herself from her past poor allegiances, Sheker changed the form of her body turning it from dragon into bird. And through burning the dragon puppets, humans burn her bad side and invoke her good side to give them a clement weather during the cold season.

They have been waiting for the first cold day just as warrior used to wait for the first cold day of the season to craft a puppet per unit and start the pyre, though to them it felt more like an invocation of home rather than the invocation of good weather.

They wait because the festival tends to take place on a different day every year, for it makes little sense to beseech for a merciful winter without harsh and frozen winds on a warm day—humans accommodate to nature and not the other way around.

Altaïr waits again, but not quite as before. In the war, he used to belong to something. Here, he isn’t even sure if he will be allowed to participate in crafting the Dragon. Malik could contribute for the both of them, but Malik is not even his family.

The thought of having a family has made him less patriotic. He had been so pleased to be getting home, after being strapped for affection for years in a foreign land, that returning here seemed a sort of paradise. Altaïr believes that not his own behavior but his very presence put him into a new world, one he hasn’t expected to find upon return. And despite the flaws, the boy across him is not what he would change, given chance.

A brief amount of time elapses before Malik is finished with his breakfast. He doesn’t leave the table. Altaïr likes to think that he has stayed to keep him company.

The silence in the room is punctuated rather than broken by the sounds of Altaïr’s eating and the brush of Malik’s little finger while it collects bread-pellets into an orderly knoll beside his plate. Though he’s intended to catalog the list of today’s work according to priority, Malik is already in an advanced stage of analyzing the man across.

Altaïr has a healthy appetite. He eats twice as much.

“Will you search for work tomorrow?”

Altaïr parts his gaze from what is his fourth loaf of peach jam to glance up at him, ”I will look for it.”

He doesn’t specify when.

“I can’t feed us both and keep us warm at the same time with my own jobs,” Malik says, warns, crushing the mound of crumbs he assembled with the side of his thumb.

Altaïr looks up anew but doesn’t look remotely concerned by this, not even as Malik goes on:

“If we eat we’ll be cold. If we’re warm, we’ll starve.”

“No one will starve,” Altaïr declares, anger patches his brows together at this ludicrous notion, “As long as I breathe, you will not starve.”

Altaïr expects a favorable reaction even if he hasn’t safely assumed he will provoke one. Malik’s expression is blank, though there’s nothing to conceal. The boy across has believed him dead for three years and has learned to live without him even before that. There is something heart-rending in the solemn expression of his young face and how easily this boy has sidestepped him and his protectiveness. Altaïr wishes his husband would give him at least a faint smile in lieu of solemn blankness but even that is too much to hope for, and he wouldn’t even dare to transmit his request.

“I will look for work tomorrow,” Altaïr assures and the next bite he takes is bitter and the peach is lumpy, “Today I’d rather be part of community, if you’ll lend instruction.”

“What do you want to know?” Malik responds with the smugness of person with torch leading a frightened figure up a rickety unlighted staircase.

“How do I stop them from hating me? How do I make myself more likeable?”

“There’s always work to be done in the community,” Malik tells him without those white and wholesome formalities, “You can start by sweeping the upper and lower ring, and then the courtyard. You don’t have to water the plants—the children do that. If you want to acquaint yourself with everyone individually, you best start with collecting compost. The garden showers need scrubbing as well. Cleaning paraphernalia is in the boil room. Oh, and you can stoke the fire and chop some wood for the boil room while you’re at it—“

“Alright. That’s enough for a start,” the warrior quips while piling the chores on top of one another. He nudges his unfinished plate ahead and, seeing this, Malik takes the hint to clear the table.

“If you leave good enough an impression, you might as well be allowed to participate in crafting the Dragon,” Malik tells him in a dimmed voice. He has no special intention of being happy or of making Altaïr happy with this outcome, nor has he the slightest misgivings as to what he himself might think of this should the community accept it; it is merely a matter of naturally accepting the unwritten law of community, and if others accept him as part of community, so will Malik.

 

* * *

 

Altaïr is making to leave his home with broom in hand when Malik accosts him barefoot, with a sandal in each hand and his attention scattered everywhere.

“We _are_ having Sheker’s festival today, one of the elderly women at the well told me,” he tells Altaïr pointing at his warrior boots for emphasis. Then he peeks into the home long enough to leave his sandals inside and drifts off into the courtyard unfazed by the warrior’s inquisitive look.

Altaïr’s dilemma is not in why he should shed his boots, it’s in what he is doing (and whether he’s been doing it consciously or unintentionally) to generate in his husband such disinterest towards himself. Gravely, confusedly, the warrior consults his own tattered understanding of Malik in silence and lastly ends all ill-starred musings with a sigh before divesting himself of his boots to leave them beside Malik’s discarded sandals.

On the day of Sheker’s festival, it is their duty to shed their footwear and walk barefoot.

When Altaïr was but a child enjoying the pleasant life at [Hiba](http://the-king-of-novices.tumblr.com/post/105028879746/live-forever-or-die-trying-the-pantheon-3-10)’s orphanage, he believed that the reason everyone walks barefoot until the great pyre is lit is because they put their faith in Sheker to bring warm winds in winter. That walking barefoot, as you would do in the summer, is a symbol of trust, to further entice the goddess into giving them a mild winter. As a growing youth, Altaïr learned that truth is cancelled and replaced by many truths to replace a conclusive state of mind. As a grown man, Altaïr has found another little truth behind walking barefoot. By shedding the comfort of shoes on the first cold day from daylight to sunset (at which time the pyre is prepared) you sacrifice to Sheker through suffering the cold ground as atonement you obtain by burning the Dragon.

People around are in jolly tumult and Altaïr knows they will all participate in making of their community’s Dragon (all except one man), and though the adults have a fond heart for crafting the puppet it pales in comparison to that of children. Yet however strong the children’s adoration for puppet making is, Altaïr doubts they fully understand why the adults sneak items into the belly of the Dragon or why they tie scrolls or letters or other private bits and pieces to the puppet’s tail. Altaïr didn’t know as a child, but he wonders whether Malik did know (because Malik ceased being a child the moment his family died) that adults attach inside and onto the puppet parts of themselves—those that remind them of something they want to forget, or something they’ve done bad over the course of the past year. And when the puppet is burned in the fire, the bad sides you have tied to it are burned along that of the goddess. Altaïr wonders if Malik ever destroyed any bad sides of his own past self in the pyre. Altaïr has burned many. It seems, though, he hasn’t burned enough of himself to make Malik admit him into their marriage.

Today, Altaïr is bereft of opportunity to burn a part of himself that is unwanted, but he leaves his boots at home and sacrifices in Sheker’s honor nevertheless.

He is wont of taking part in this custom, he wants to participate, but seeing that the public feeling is against him, the warrior takes a broom into his hands and begins to sweep.

 

* * *

 

By the time Altaïr has swept up what little dust there was on the upper ring, his feet have accustomed to the chilly stone below, and the news about Sheker’s festival has been noised all over the hill.

Sans any bias or favoritism, Altaïr has cleared up the upper ring first not because his own home is situated on this story, but because sweeping the place upside-down appears to him the most logical course of action. He has been neither interrupted nor corrected by anyone and he’s taken his approval in whatever form it has come. Both story rings consist of two staircases dissecting the rings on two parallel sides, with the only difference occurring in the placement and the shape of staircases—whereas the twin staircases between the lower and upper story are tunnel-staircases, the two leading from the lower ring into the courtyard are regular staircases flanked by the statues of Nokem and [Gdila](http://the-king-of-novices.tumblr.com/post/104486350666/live-forever-or-die-trying-the-pantheon-2-10) at the exit where they melt into the cobblestones of the court. Whereas the tunnel-staircases have a south-north placement, the regular ones are placed along the east-west line, thus in a way dividing the space on the two floors into four quarters.

Altaïr has been long raking up his brain in the solitary recess of his own mind, long enough to completely fail to notice two girls who have been sweeping the floor below him, and the realization that they had seen him work and continued to do their own share of work on the ring below nonpluses him.

He shoves himself down a tunnel-staircase he is yet to sweep to ask that they let him finish the chore on his own, which they meaningfully accept. With near two quarters swept clean, Altaïr’s work on the lower ring has been cut in half. He is unsure whether the people he encounters on the floors think of him as Malik’s husband or a novice trying to prove himself (or both), but he continues from where the girls left off, this time paying closer attention to his surroundings. And in doing so, he discovers for the first time since embarking on this task that another newcomer is in their community, that newcomer being Ezio who seems to be more accepted already than Altaïr himself.

Down in the courtyard, there are several goings on.

On the garden parcel, on a spot farthest from the tree, Ezio is digging up a pond. Or rather, he is already edging the pond while a couple of youths are filling the crevices with a layer of sand. The pond hole seems deep enough that it won’t freeze solid over the winter, but Altaïr doubts it will have even a smattering of fish. A couple of artfully arranged stones, if at all. It must be destined for other purposes.

It’s not the pond that gives Altaïr trouble. It’s not Ezio’s familiarity with more people of his community that festers—Ezio always did possess an unrivaled and inexhaustible mother-wit. That pond down there has taken up a considerable space on the garden plot, and enterprise of such scale requires consent from all other members of community.

Malik must have consented in his stead, which is not so much an established practice as the fact that he has no say in this. His consent is not necessary. No matter how many honors he had received from Al Mualim or how much praise had been bestowed upon him by commanders, on this battlefield—he is a nobody.

The warrior takes a breath which dissolves into an unbecoming sigh. A few more people pass him while he stands there, homes are close-pressed on each floor ring and it seems less apartments are empty than when he bought his home, but he continues his sweeping meticulously during the rush back-and-forth between homes and courtyard which lasts short enough to not disturb his work.

He hears soft footfalls and thinks nothing of it, and in the process of turning around he almost collides with the whistling figure behind his back. Altaïr looks jaded, bevvy, and that’s how she finds him as they run into each other. He links eyes with her and finds her looking.

“Greetings,” says Anne, and a tiny, familiar fist breaks out from the swathe in her arms as if to join her salutation. Altaïr nods mutely but offers nothing much more valuable besides that. Anne is a sight for sore eyes—a young woman in pearly tunic with purple facings and generous cleavage and dazzling smiles, all of which combine into a curious motherly bounce with a swaddle-full of Talia as the cherry on top—but Altaïr’s gaze unquestioningly drops to the swaddle. The familiar chubby face seeks him out and Altaïr wonders how a tiny being can be so valuable to expel a portion of bitterness from the left side of his chest and allow warmth to fly in instead.

He would like to touch her, but the cleanliness of his hands is a thing questionable and he refrains from initiating more than a curious peek into the swaddle, a move upon which Anne closes the gap between them with an impish grin on lips and cheek Altaïr is serenely unaware of, and a subtle nudge towards him.

“She has taken you for her pet,” Anne says and, just as Altaïr leans in to exploit this opportunity and pet the back of his knuckle against a chubby cheek, Talia grasps him by a finger or two (or finger and a half) as if to use her mother’s words as a kind of springboard for leaping into this awaited chance. Her clutch is strong like yesterday but the gesture in itself is quite innocent and endearing, and trying to erase any trace of a subtle smile before a mother would be an attempt futilely spent. So he smiles and Talia keeps his fingers captive, the ones that she has managed to trap in her steady grip.

“I received word from Mary. You have my thanks for taking care of my child,” Anne tells him, and it doesn’t matter that they’re speaking in whispers, it’s doesn’t matter that he nearly feels the warmth of her breast on the back of his hand while he pets Talia, it doesn’t matter that they’re standing this close on a wide hallway, for Altaïr is too absorbed by the bundle in her arm and a hint of a babyish coo, and hers is the voice of a mother.

“At times I think I’m not fit to be a mother yet, but Mary...” she stops at the onset of what seems to be a topic now worn to a thread, and it’s not his inability to help that paints and repaints Altaïr’s face (she never came expecting answers to questions she doesn’t know how to ask), it’s the honesty with which he has just been approached by another member of the community that’s fresh and bright and stunning. Altaïr has known Anne’s face before she even entered into matrimony with Mary. She’s been one of the first faces he’s seen when he purchased his home, and there’s some poetic justice in the fact that she was the first person he has seen in his community seven years after—this time as a young mother breastfeeding a child he’s grown fond of aleady.

“Listen,” she seizes him by the bicep and they share a look, “You’ve swept both rings already and the courtyard is a hopeless case after rain, especially with so many people milling about. If you truly want them to notice you, I suggest turning to collecting compost. That is how you’ll get to everyone individually.”

Anne is younger than he is, though not by much. He pretends to think and it’s a shamming act; he’s already all set to follow the advice of a younger woman with a remarkable resolve to make him feel more welcome. Perhaps she too knows the role of an outsider, though this is blind presumption at best.

Between them, Talia is still picking at Altaïr’s idle fingers.

“She will shriek and squall even if there’s no real reason,” Anne explains the big mysteries of a small character as she works on unplucking her bitty fingers from Altaïr’s hand, “but she finds comfort in strangest toys. You’re the only other person besides Malik she’s fond of.”

Having removed even the tiniest finger from Altaïr’s, Anne draws the swaddle closer to her chest before arresting his bicep again into a hold and her grip is strong and innocent.

When she leaves, Altaïr knows their exchange hasn’t been merest trifle. He skirts the courtyard going straight for his home to deposit the broom, then he hurries to the compost barrel down in the courtyard to get the bucket attached to it. It’s empty and clean without a foul smell—no one has collected waste yet and his chance is ripe.

What annoys Altaïr invariably (other than the fetid odor of a combined pulp of leftovers) is that he has to circle the entire ring at least three times in order to cover every home, owning mostly to the fact that people come and go to participate in crafting of the Dragon or generally just to spend time in the courtyard.

As a part of this repetitive arrangement, he receives severance in form of getting to know every member of his community by name and face. That is reward enough. Though the play has been repetitive, the characters that perform it have been as colorful as the scraps they’ve given him for collecting. His inquiry about decaying compost might have been repetitive but his journey during this overall hubbub has brought him no ordinary experiences, most notable among them: recognizing the old neighbor who sold him goat milk and cornbread for Malik seven years ago (a man who is now the grandfather of two), being invited to tea thrice by a jolly collection of elderly women, being entrusted with an entire saga of Ezio’s and Leonardo’s pond and its future uses (a tale recounted by Salai), and being unsubtly groped by a girl who is beyond any doubt younger than Malik, then by her mother.

On the whole, for a task comprised entirely of collecting bucketfuls of waste to fill a compost barrel, this has turned out to be a moderately smelly adventure of meeting a medley of people in a limited space.

Collecting compost itself consists primarily of recycling all organic waste that can’t be spent anywhere else for those who need it, namely the grain fields and orchards situated in the break between [Hiba](http://the-king-of-novices.tumblr.com/post/105028879746/live-forever-or-die-trying-the-pantheon-3-10)’s hill and the volcano. Collecting this recycling material consists of field workers picking up all compost barrels from each community to turn what is waste for one into what is fertilizer for the other, then returning the compost barrels to their respective communities.

Between visiting the first apartment and emptying the last compost bucket to seal the barrel again, an unknown expansion of time has gone asprawl. Altaïr hurries to tackle his next chore in the boil room, to thereafter find an excuse to join the crowd in the courtyard, even if this ‘joining’ amounts to pestering Malik and watching others.

Downstairs on the first ring, there is the boil room common to all community members, with free firing and a supply of wood, brooms, buckets, even amphoras for olive oil. In the very heart of the room is a great clinker fire which is kept burning day and night the year through. It serves as kindling when the fire in your home wears out in winter, and in summer it serves to warm the water for showers in the courtyard, since the aqueduct branch supplying their shower runs directly through the boiling room.

The work of tending the fire, sweeping the community from second ring down, and cleaning the showers is done by the members in random rotation.

When he crosses the threshold, Altaïr is half-mind to leave the massive hardwood door agape but he is momentarily aware that someone had wanted it closed for a purpose. The boil room is a low-ceiled cellar, very hot and drowsy with fire fumes, and lighted only by the fire. If you are in need of a quick dry and you don’t mind the smell of burned wood on your fabrics, the boil room is the perfect place to spread your stuff. Altaïr looks about and finds a few pieces of washing hung on a string from the ceiling, laid out on varying distances from the fire, depending on how quick the people need their clothes dry.

The warrior is unaware of company until the black velvet shadows the fire casts into corners suddenly shift. On the other side of the room, Mary is sitting in the fierce glare of the fire. There are two other stools, a little further behind her back, and in the corner to her right, a huge pile of firewood.

The guard sits in a harmless silence and the warrior doesn’t ignite conversation either. The stern look on her face warns him to steer clear of Mary.

When he passes round the fire he finds her guarding over two pieces of washing that look like nappies and waiting for the clothes to dry. Altaïr lets her dry Talia’s clothing and turns to the firewood. He is unsure how much firewood they usually expect to be there but what is stacked here in an orderly pile seems more than enough and he wonders whether Malik has been unaware of this, whether he has led him astray for a purpose, whether he should take up the ax and start cutting up one of the bulky log pieces pushed against the wall.

“There’s enough,” tells a voice from behind. By the judging, Mary has been the one to chop it up before he even got the chance. With rich intention and poor results, Altaïr gathers up a handful of firewood logs to replenish the fire with, yet as he turns to settle before the fire, he finds it in no need for new wood. The fire is regularly fed by the members and finding it already well-fixed by Mary is little surprise. He adds another log for a show, and to feel less useless.

As Altaïr sits down on the other stool he feels something stir near his feet and, looking down, he sees a glimmering black of a shifting fur; it’s a cat. It appears to be an adult animal engaged in trying to capture the last morsel stuck quite inconveniently in her irregularly–shaped food vessel. Altaïr scoops the wet morsel out and it’s taken up with eagerness, until the last trace of it is licked up from the tip of his finger. He twists his wrist to smooth his hand down the cat’s back but she cunningly evades his touch, and though she remains within his arm’s reach, the animal rejects his simple petting. He sighs noiselessly wallowing in a morass of this parody of acceptance. The only member of the community that seems to have accepted him entirely is the daughter of the woman frowning at him from the side.

“Anne sends her greetings,” says the guard at last, looking at the warrior squarely. Altaïr nods and gives a shifty smile and Mary looks away.

There’s space enough for Altaïr to cram in the smallest of the logs he brought along onto the already compact fuel load, the rest he transfers from his lap onto the floor beside the furnace. He takes up the fire iron to poke around and the glare of the fire envelops him painlessly. The warmth, though removed from human one, takes on a strange beauty and the idea of time, which has melted down for a moment, now seems to curl up and fall asleep.

Mary doesn’t move even after a long while and that is what stirs him from the reverie.

He chances a glance and the cat is coiled into a breathing ball between them, and she’s still there, waiting for the nappies to dry. A dutiful woman protecting her city at night and her community at day and her family at all time. He has all she left behind and she has all Altaïr wants to have.

This thought runs parallel with his thoughts of community, until it branches off and nuzzles up to his own marriage and the thought of Malik fits itself inside his skull plunging him suddenly from cave to cove, and he leaves the boil room to investigate.

On his way out of the boil room, he collects what he will need for scrubbing the shower floor and cleaning the shower heads, though it’s clear from the first glance at the shower ring that he will have to wait until it’s vacant.

Altaïr loafs there for a moment of time with a hand on the stone railing and cleaning necessities in the other one. There is some irony in that he has made himself useful at last and they will not even properly notice him. It’s interesting to watch the community and sad to know he isn’t part of it.

Ezio doesn’t pretend to visit Altaïr anymore. He is coming to Leonardo now.

They loiter at the pond-in-making, Leonardo braiding Ezio’s ponytail with a collection of small plaits (a scene which strangely reminds him of [Ya’ar](http://the-king-of-novices.tumblr.com/post/114871631011/live-forever-or-die-trying-the-pantheon-6-10) braiding [Daga](http://the-king-of-novices.tumblr.com/post/105887755561/live-forever-or-die-trying-the-pantheon-4-10)'s long hair)  and Ezio sitting at the edge of the pond up to his knees in water, and the children torn between filling the pond with bucketfuls of water and decorating the Dragon.

Some children are eating from a plate of warm honey buns, there are knots of people at all the corners. They are singing to the tune of two children playing the cithara.

The air is less feverish with blood and more feverish with life.

He wonders if Ezio is as happy as he looks. He wonders how he will fit into the noisy life in the hub of a community with laughter-not-steel clattering through the courtyard, where people are better dressed and the faces comelier and milder and more alike in cheerfulness, without that fierce individuality of suffering and malice of war. There is less blood, less dirt, and less quarreling, and more cheerful tranquility.

A gust of wind sends the clouds wheeling across the sky leaving a few sunny spots behind. They’re rare but dotting the sky without disturbing its overall bleakness.

Altaïr sighs during his climb down the staircase, and disappears between two plump columns to descend into the shower ring. There are two other people in the showers, two youths—a boy and a girl with beautifully smooth arms and legs—who seem to be passionate depilators. Nestled on a shared towel on the middle stair between ground level above and shower floor below, they sit gabbing away as they seek out every little hair to pluck out with their tweezers. Altaïr leaves them sans disturbance or rush and deposits his cleaning supplies on the center of the shower ring, a little off the drain in the center. The tiles are cold beneath his feet, scarcely warmed by the few and infrequent sunny spots that peek through the gaps in clouds.

He could start with the shower heads before the youths are ready to leave, but he prefers to do his work in one go so he waits watching between the circle columns while the Dragon takes shape. The puppet consists of a wooden framework, crafted by adults, and a red airy cloth with beautifully-rendered scarlet scales fitted over it. It’s as big as the massive table it’s propped on. Its belly is unstitched and open for people to put their items inside, those that are of more private nature such as letters and scrolls and drawings, its spine is lined with a cord of fur where people are binding pieces of themselves they wish to burn, and tying colorful decoration, and in the case of a young woman sitting at the end of its tail—stitching a binding of her own freshly-cut hair into the fur. Altaïr wonders what made her cut it off; has a man or woman she no longer loves adored her hair? Have they loved to pet the hair she no longer wants? The Dragon comes with as many stories as there are items attached to it.

Altaïr would like to privy into the one Malik is carving into the puppet as he paints twined lines of calligraphy along its sides. Is his husband decorating the puppet with ink or leaving his own story etched into the scales that will be burned tonight, and if the latter is the case—is _he_ involved in it? He watches him unwittingly, until his paintbrush exhausts the last drop of ink, until he leaves the patterns to dry and goes to the well to wash his hands.

“Malik!” The call marches forth from his throat before he makes the effort to imagine what he will say. Malik has been swilling the water around in the bucket he washed his ink-stained hands in, and then he turns his head towards the showers to find Altaïr a slave to confusion, standing between two columns.

“Bring me oil and a sharp blade, I’d see this stubble removed from my face,” Altaïr says at last, forgetting that to perceive Malik through the prism of his own expectation is useless, that Malik won’t ever be obedient when ordered, unless obedience is born of a free will.

“Bring it yourself,” Malik throws back at him with a mouthful of frown, and then he resumes his own task.

Altaïr opens his mouth to retort with mirrored pleasantry or apology when a hand clasps around his shoulder and his gaze swerves to the side to find—Desmond.

Desmond is at his readable stage. He looks as sullen as Altaïr feels. He must have parted on bad terms with whoever he’s seen last. His grip unwinds and his loosely-curled hand passes down Altaïr’s arm until it comes to rest naturally in the crook of his elbow, and it seems to Altaïr that Desmond himself is seeking comfort through this touch. Altaïr bends his elbow further to offer better purchase to Desmond’s hold, he splays his hand atop to extend the offer to either silence or words, whichever Desmond needs first.

“I’ve received an order,” he tells Altaïr in a hushed tone, and the warrior expects bad tidings. Altaïr pulls him further into the gap between the columns to nudge him to speech, and Desmond breaks the news.

“We’ve received order to turn in our weapons and armor. I’ve come to collect yours.”

“We need to part with our armor...?” Altaïr mouths at last and in these few moments he is already in mourning for an intimate part of himself. Desmond nods wordlessly and there is no doubt. Altaïr stares, a foul expression bubbling up onto his face, as though the man’s bowels are being churned up within him. That the warriors are disbanded is a great dark wound still gaping wide, but that their armors are to be taken is shredding the little tissue that has been left intact in clefts hidden from sight.

“I would speak but I’ve an itch in my throat,” he whispers with an imitation of calmness that’s feeble at best; something in him is decaying.

“That would be the cock they just forced out of your mouth,” Desmond says with a self-depreciating smile that is too incompatible with actual smiles to be compared to one in the first place. Desmond’s language is crude as always but his words ring true. When Altaïr’s silence seems to be on the point of being exploited, Desmond pulls him along, and they start upstairs.

They don’t sit for long in Altaïr’s home, but most of the time they do they frankly idle.

Desmond sits hunched on the low sofa nursing a drink and giving Altaïr time to cope with the unexpected hit. On the low table between the three wings of the sofa, his armor is spread out, except for the boots—they are where he has left them earlier. He sits on the carpet, with bent knees and thighs resting on calves, unwilling to leave imprints of his possibly dusty feet on the carpet. Warfare has been their career, cut short, the armor has been their relic, their mark of belonging to something. A brotherhood, a sisterhood, a creed. It’s been their community when they had none, and the armor its symbol. It’s convenient that Ezio is here as well today, Altaïr can’t imagine Desmond able to travel another distance to relay the same news.

Altaïr touches his armor for the last time. He looks it up and down, and back and forth between armor pieces, he knows them all by heart without looking; the number of feathers on his warrior skirt—five scratched beyond repair during battle, two smudged with uncleanable coal stains—his sash, torn and mended together at a place he’s able to hide and one he’s not, his leather belt, gashed at the side where the rest of the gash runs up his ribs as an old scar, his spaulron and helmet with bumps he’s measured through touch countless times, his tail whose strands he had attempted to count individually and ended each attempt with slumber, his sword, beautiful and bloody. All these parts of himself he is ordered to give up.

Desmond waits. Altaïr browses the details of each item unceasingly, with nostalgic excursions into the past, until it’s time to put each away into the burlap sack. His sash he rolls up into a tight bundle and winds his belt around it. His sword he leaves in the scabbard. The skirt he packs into the sack before the spauldron, and before he adds the helmet and boots to it, he takes the sack up, and Desmond follows.

They stand at the door, the sack loose between them, and helmet in Altaïr’s hands. He stares at its beak and it stares right back at him, its shine seems dim and gloomy. He is unaware of how much time has passed when Desmond finally crouches to spread the sack open as way of soliciting Altaïr into depositing the helmet inside. Altaïr is unable to part with it. Not until someone takes it from him. And when Desmond does and their fingers touch as he takes the helmet from the back, Altaïr is still unable to allow him to pull it from his grip.

Desmond handles Altaïr’s expression with the utmost care. He doesn’t speak; attempting speech would be a haphazard jumble of worthless words. He removes his hands from the helmet and allows Altaïr to draw it further against his chest. Desmond doesn’t object. He must have retained a part of armor as well.

“What did you keep?”

Desmond points at his ordinary leather belt mutely. A familiar scarlet peeks from it.

The sash. What a curious choice.

“The boots?” Desmond asks. Lenient as he is, he can cover the lack of one item, and no more than that. Altaïr has no intention of preserving his boots in like manner, but he refuses to let others have them in their current dusty state.

“They require a scrub. I’ll add them to your load later, tonight at worst,” Altaïr explains smoothing his hand down his helmet tail. There, at the ivory tip, he picks up the first strand that allows itself into his hold, and he straightens this single thread out, he knows Desmond is watching. He crawls down to the root of the thread and, delving blindly into the thick root, he plucks the thread out from the tail. Its loss is hardly felt in the thick richness of the tail.

“I can’t show up with one single hair in place of a helmet. You better give me nothing if that’s what you’ve intended,” Desmond jests knowing full well that Altaïr intended no such thing, yet left with no explanation he embarks on a private guess and narrows down to the festival they celebrate today.

Altaïr parts his mouth to confirm his inkling, but Malik leaves him no chance.

He enters as surprised as they are at finding him barge in between them, but Malik’s sudden advent doesn’t effectively scuttle Altaïr’s original intention. The warrior allows Desmond and Malik to embrace in greeting, he measures his timing, and then he pulls up his hand to bar Malik’s entrance revealing to his husband the single thread coiled around the join of his three middle fingers.

“Can I tie this to the Dragon?”

Malik is not unfriendly but susceptible to quick frowning while he regards the coiled strand of hair trying to divulge its origin or meaning. Altaïr has an irritating way of piquing and feeding his inquisitive side at odd times.

“What is that?” He asks glancing over the thread afresh and gradually replacing suspicion with curiosity.

A flicker of grief on Altaïr’s face is either cunningly carved out or genuine (and Malik shouldn’t feel a twinge in his chest regardless of its origin), the drag of thumb across the curled thread is deliberate, and Altaïr’s voice is weaved with a tone Malik knows intimately—the slow pain of a martyred mouth.

“A thread from my helmet tail. You tie what you want to bid farewell to, do you not? I wish to burn my past allegiances.”

Altaïr is saying good bye to his allegiance to Al Mualim. Burning his past self. This is how he wishes to contribute to the puppet-making.

These and other thoughts are serenely browsing a corner of Malik’s mind while he stares at the little big thing coiled round his husband’s fingers. Mindful of deep symbolism and deeper implications, Malik answers his question with a nod without glancing up at him. He slips past the two warriors taking care to not even graze Altaïr—he feels he has for an instance mellowed out to the point where his body has made a passing allusion that it might embrace Altaïr, and he doesn’t wish to share space with the man when such a stray sentimentality in mind is forming a cord with his body’s wishes. It’s best to avoid being too bodily familiar with his husband for the time being, for as long as he can help it.

He heads for his bedroom. Behind, Altaïr saunters off in Desmond’s wake with boots in hand and thread on finger.

 

* * *

 

Once Malik encroaches the territory of his bedroom, he needs another few moments to remember why he has come in here and it’s nonsense to pretend that his mind isn’t still loyal in thought to the man who’s left home just now. He isn’t insulted in any way by this, for Altaïr has shown improvement enough to elicit such reaction, but he consoles himself by thinking how brave he has been, how determined to avoid freely venturing into physical closeness.

Malik's gaze skids unconsciously to [Nokem](http://the-king-of-novices.tumblr.com/post/104486337526/live-forever-or-die-trying-the-pantheon-1-10) (his face is benevolent today, a suggestion of a cryptic smirk on his mouth) and subsequently drops to the base Nokem rests upon, and on the pedestal is where he finds what he came for in the first place. There is an assortment of items across the pedestal, among these the bowl for pouring libation for his patron, a colorful compendium of feathers Malik has collected over years, a glass figurine.

Malik came for the figurine.

A year has passed and it doesn't belong to him anymore; he has to return it to the fire it came from.

Tonight, after all Dragon puppets are burned in the pyre, glassmiths of the city will take out their tools and heat glass all night long in the pyre. All night they will melt and blow glass on flames, crafting bird figurines for all citizens who wish to take one home. The owl figurine in Malik’s hands has been born in the pyre of last year. It has a yellowish tint and a pair of big azure eyes, its base is massive. Malik wonders if there’s fairness in the fact that he has received such a massive figurine when he never even breaks his. He has never broken his festival figurine in the past.

The glass figurines are believed to help a person let go of that side of yourself you want to get rid of. Everyone who participates in the festival is eligible to receive their glass figurine from a glassmith. Though the glass artists will make one for any person who asks, Malik has heard rumors that they will look at your face first and craft you a bird you remind them of. He wonders if there is some truth in this widespread rumor, he wonders what on his face had reminded the glassmith of owls while he admires the figurine that has kept him company for a year, one that will tonight be destroyed in the pyre because it hasn’t been broken.

Breaking the figurine deliberately is sacrilege Malik wouldn’t dream of. There is a tinge of sadness on his face but no surprise in his heart—he always does place his figurine on inconspicuous places, though he’s also known people with children who put their figurines on busy tables and their figurines never get accidentally broken either. It will break if gods decide it will. Malik had asked for a figurine in the past four years, he had received this-or-that version of an owl each time even when he asked a different glass artist every year, and he has up to now never broken his figurine by accident. You may place your figurine where you wish—on floor if you so decide—when you return home after the pyre, and Malik has always fixed his own upon [Nokem](http://the-king-of-novices.tumblr.com/post/104486337526/live-forever-or-die-trying-the-pantheon-1-10)’s pedestal.

If it happens that you never inadvertently break your figurine over the course of the year after you’ve received it, by the time the next festival comes with a new cold season, you return this figurine to the place it came from, to the pyre where it will be destroyed, rebirthed, melted into new ones. If the gods happen to favor you though, if your figurine falls to shards on accident, the signs are good—the breaking of old is a step forward to letting go of the past you want to leave behind.

The gods have not favored Malik. His figurine is intact, unchipped, unscratched, as are the flaws he has wanted to destroy in himself. Perhaps his new figurine will break, next year, before the next pyre is due.

This one he has to bring out, like everyone else whose glass figurine hasn’t fallen to crumble, to gather them all and collect them in a single basket to carry to Sheker’s market. In the kitchen he assembles the rest of fresh loaves from breakfast to share with community—they’ve made arrangements for new bread to be made for the communal dinner, and the bread will be plentiful. To leave his breakfast loaves uneaten here is to let them go waste.

With a platter in hand, loaves and glass figurine on it, he scrambles back into the courtyard.

He walks as far as he can manage, and then something arrests his attention.

Before he is even to reach the table, he passes the water-well (though he never gets to pass it entirely), and on the well a few girls he usually shares the washing space with are staring at the showers across in rapt attention. To call it staring would do their expressions no justice, to name it swooning would enhance their reactions untruthfully. It’s the sort of excitement endured by someone who’s laid eyes on someone or something they covet, the way Malik has seen others pine, a look often spotted and never endured.

Malik follows the path the girls find as enticing as to divert them from washing that easily, and at its end, he finds none other than his own husband. In the showers. A lone figure shaving his chest.

Malik turns laughingly rigid in his stance. A frozen puppet unaware of the course it intended to travel. There is a timely reminder in his head which tells him that, unlike the girls who are at least partly hidden by the well, he is exposed, quite exposed, and yet this warning doesn’t move his limbs—not even a stir.

Altaïr stands nude in the showers, oblivious to spectators.

That Altaïr shaves his chest is of little importance (it has always been a widespread preference among male warriors), it’s the manner in which he plies his blade that draws attention to his body.

The way in which the blade glides across skin and comes to resistance on the fullness of his pecs. It’s in how he moves, how his muscles catch the sun and the blade catches on the ridges of his muscle with every deliberate drag. In the way the patina of oil on his abdomen gleams when he puffs his chest up. It’s all this, and more, that makes Malik's gaze rove over his body until his eyes are religiously following each of his movements.

He stands cemented in mid-courtyard by himself, guiltily wolfing the sight of Altaïr’s impeccable form.

Malik isn’t supposed to hand over his will at the merest glance of this man’s body—he’s looked at him before, so what difference does it make now, why is there such discrepancy between now and the other instances when he’s seen him naked? What had caused revolt and disgust on the first night with Altaïr now provides him with unbridled curiosity—a sentiment that is difficult to accept with an equal amount of thrill and self-depreciation in it, a vile blend. Malik has seen bodies before, of peers and of warriors who prance around half-naked in armor, but none had made him yearn touch in like manner.

It’s not that he hasn’t noticed before; rather, it’s that he is invited to watch now when Altaïr is unaware of it that he has that one memory to borrow from again and his imagination helps itself freely to it, and though Malik isn’t inordinately fond of the context of that particular memory he remembers that he’s never had quarrel with his husband’s physique per se, only with the man himself. And he has not dedicated much attention to Altaïr’s looks before because he’s been so adamant about hating him. The instant Altaïr renounced loyalty to Al Mualim, the moment he announced that his contribution to the Dragon will be burning his past allegiance, Malik restricted loathing and found himself with more time to notice other things about his husband he had formerly neglected.

That is the lone explanation he can offer himself, and it’s as far as his logic can go, and his logic is warped and deformed, and for a bizarre moment of time this enamored admiration of Altaïr’s body conjoins with that of the girls on the water-well and they stare in unison. One moment easily turns into more.

It hasn’t been a conscientious decision to dedicate that much time watching another man’s body, but it is conscientiously thorough admiration. He stands like [Gdila](http://the-king-of-novices.tumblr.com/post/104486350666/live-forever-or-die-trying-the-pantheon-2-10) ready for war, like a man sharing blood with gods themselves. There’s no flatness of belly as on Malik’s own body, but the undulating swell of muscles on such a brazen display of his entire torso, unlike that of before, in armor.

No man is equal to his physical beauty.

His flesh is hard like marble, carved by the gods, forged by [Gdila](http://the-king-of-novices.tumblr.com/post/104486350666/live-forever-or-die-trying-the-pantheon-2-10) himself.

Malik stands limp with tray in hand and not a word he can utter, but his belly answers for him with a disgraceful, warm flip which it sets up at the sight of Altaïr’s body. Mentally, he isn’t even present at the scene. Perhaps the girls at his back are watching along still, he wants to look away, but his body won’t hear of it. His gut yearns at the thought of getting, perhaps, _something_ , and yet he can’t bring himself to risk the thought of _what do I want_.

Altaïr wipes the blade off his forearm migrating towards his lower belly, down the dusting of hair trailing from his bellybutton downwards into the valley between the shaped cut in his lower abdominal muscles (how curious that he prefers to remove hairs below the belt-line as well), and Malik funnels down both sides of these oblique, clear-cut, ridged muscles pointing into Altaïr’s groin, he tumbles from the hollowed-out lines right down to his husband’s cock.

And, then, it seems as if the gates fall open with a bang and thoughts begin to file in one at a time into Malik’s mind. What it feels like to touch, to give hands a free run down Altaïr’s chest, to sample the texture of his scars, how much fatter than that does his cock swell, is it as thick as it had felt between his thighs, what does it look like to have a warrior’s rough hands caress smooth skin as his own—these and a barrage of other equally outlandish questions harass his body and Malik knows neither the places they are coming from nor going to, and though he hasn’t intended to keep a check on the movements of his thoughts he asks himself whether he’s lost mind and every voice in head unanimously says _yes_.

Malik prefers to smuggle some blankness into his expression to keep his face unwillingly clean while his body is beaten by the sight of this man, and this sight sends warmth working its way up from his groin searching every limb and joint, and there’s a great wave of something _sweet_ which he knows in a much muted form from rare lonely occasions in his bedroom, with no place to hide it and no chance of escaping the rush.

Clothes feel a dreadful burden but they conceal far worse things; to see his body reaction for what it really is, unmitigated, one has to see Malik naked, and he would rather keep the burden than reveal that his cock has grown stiff from merely watching his husband.

Malik is tragically aware of this and for an instance he falls into a panic about public exposure, since he is oblivious to how noticeable the tenting at the front of his breeches actually is and terrified of glancing down to examine and still entranced with Altaïr’s form in equal measure. He stands same as before, his heart is tramping away with a dreadful arrhythmic sound, like an army going over a bridge; yet his body continues to misbehave in the most outrageous way and in the meantime he yields to the satisfaction of a special craving he hasn’t been victim to before.

He goes on with his dismal watching until he lowers the front end of his packed tray to mask what he feels is evident at his lower front, and just as he is about to cover it up completely he unwittingly tips out the contents of his tray.

Loaves tumble to ground, glass breaks.

Malik retreats in a flinch aiming to avoid the debris, and in his haste he steps on a broken shard of glass hurled through impact behind his back. He retracts his foot in an instant (there is blood, too much than he’s comfortable with) and avoiding new shards at his front he restores his step to its former place leaning his weight onto the cut foot without mistrust.

If the break of glass hasn’t been clue enough already, his yelp of pain as he steps onto his injured foot glues most attention to him. He’s forced the glass shards deeper into his flesh through carelessness, there’s blood painting the cobblestones beneath his feet, the bread that’s strewn round, the shards scattered around him, in his vision as he watches new blood leave him and endures the sting in flesh.

“Hold still,” says Altaïr, gripping him by the elbow. Malik is still plagued by discomfort of his awkward haste and he’s in a sort of confused, pained delirium that, when he sees Altaïr hunched, in boots, trying to tuck him up into his arms, the intentions of his husband confuse whatever rational pattern has managed to shine through his blinded mind.

Before Malik knows it, Altaïr has picked him up.

He almost bursts in response to this coddle, his mind and thoughts turn lucid and force him to persevere in his struggle. Altaïr is less unsettled by Malik’s useless pushing against his chest and more concerned by the splatter of blood Malik’s injury has left on the ground, and he pulls Malik up, further against his chest, and doesn’t dignify the youth’s protest as he carries him up home.

Someone will take care of the mess in the courtyard and he has to take care of Malik.

Malik ceases his struggle and tries to inject some dignity into his position. Altaïr has been right to help him up, he couldn’t have hopped his way up to the second ring on one foot anyway, so Malik keeps his embarrassment well-hidden and doesn’t allow it to leave its lair. At least his other problem has ceased to be a problem, under influence of pain.

Malik’s journey upstairs in Altaïr’s arms is altogether too startling to dwell on and little of it stays in his mind, except for a flash of the past which invades his memory—a big, daunting warrior and a fresh orphan of ten in his arms, and a giant tree in a courtyard that used to be empty.

At the door, his struggle renews, more violently this time, until he is physically grasping at the wall to prevent Altaïr from introducing them to the innards of their home.

“No blood inside the house,” Malik growls with fury that lasts only a few heartbeats, and this, at least, Altaïr understands.

“Hold onto my neck,” the warrior instructs shifting his weight. The arm wound round Malik’s back drops and returns in a few moments time, and the alarm bells in Malik’s mind are in the midst of their chimes when he recognizes the cloth that Altaïr is looping around his foot in an impromptu wrapping as Altaïr’s loincloth and thus the only piece of cloth that has been covering the man until now.

Altaïr’s arm is back around his back in an instant, he makes it seem effortless. It’s odd that Malik has the weight of a healthy young man yet Altaïr carries him with same lightness as seven years ago. His strength hasn’t waned but flourished overtime.

Altaïr shepherds him into the home and left towards the sofa where he deposits him with greatest care despite Malik’s persistent fuming, and orders him onto his belly. As soon as Altaïr slips from the room Malik stations himself further up, bolts for the huddle of pillows in the corner to avoid being pulled back into Altaïr’s lap, but he stays lolled on the sofa, less from gratitude than lacking the cheek to go. Not now when he feels the shards embedded deeply into his foot and when he can’t roll over without imagining what must be a stream of blood trickling down his sole, when he can’t hop off the sofa without soiling his carpet and when he can’t even process the damage of the cut.

Noting Altaïr’s prolonged absence, a din of oaths and a suspicious cluttering of pans, Malik remembers to yelp out to Altaïr about the whereabouts of the supplies, and he feels his flesh pulse with pain—he wants the shards out.

Altaïr returns with a pair of tweezers, bandages, water, the amphora of antiseptic he’s watched Malik use, a loincloth to cover himself. Malik faces that particular detail with a blank mind because any form of acknowledgement would force him to think of the man whom he has adored from afar before drifting into insanity.

Altaïr seats himself pulling him lower across sofa to fix him more securely into his lap and Malik flaunts some resistance but his show of anger resolves into demure reality the moment Altaïr chains his ankle to his upper thigh. Altaïr’s gesture is well-meaning but pain shoots through Malik’s foot climbing upwards in a slow, agonizing crawl. He is promptly reminded that the shards are inside, and he wants them _out_. He should ask Leonardo for help later, but Altaïr’s intervention will do for now. He must have seen worse injuries on battlefield, this one he can be trusted with.

“No blood—“ Malik starts and stops when he recognizes the sensation on his injured foot as a steady trickle of water, but Altaïr shushes him. He is taking his duty with utmost gravity and seriousness. Between his thighs is a bowl encouraging the soiled water inside. Even with the spare cloth spread below bowl and across Altaïr’s legs to soak up water and blood that might escape, Malik feels the shift of Altaïr’s thigh muscles on his ankle and the softness with which he plies his rough fingers while cleaning around his wound.

Altaïr moves to washing with antiseptic quick. There is injury on one foot only, but the sole is marked with curious swirls of dust, like a marble table-top, no doubt from walking barefoot as part of the festival. Altaïr fears what dirt can do if it gets into the wound, and he makes quick work of cleaning him with water and antiseptic alike, generously, sparing no amounts of the sharp-smelling disinfectant. Malik’s muscles are pulled tight, his calf tense and toes curled, he tenses whenever the liquid is poured. He plays brave but it must hurt. Pulling the bigger shard out is bound to tear a sound, unless Malik’s pride is too large for such base reactions in front of Altaïr.

He keeps his arms clasped tight-and-rigid around his favorite neck pillow, his forehead squashed atop it, his fingers plucking and pulling blindly at the tassels whenever he seeks distraction.

“Are the tweezers sterilized?” Altaïr asks calmly, and Malik is relieved that at least one of them is calm.

“Boiled in water. But wash them first, with antiseptic,” he croaks, and whatever composure he had intended to instill into his voice is lost before he can pretend. Altaïr doesn’t comment. He must be seeing him as some weakling, the scarred warrior that he is, and the thought stings almost as bad as the injury.

Before he knows what has occurred, Altaïr pulls a shard out keeping his ankle shackled to his thigh and Malik remembers to tense up when it’s no longer needed. He hopes it is the bigger one, and it is.

“It will need stitching,” Altaïr says in the midst of extracting the smaller piece of glass, Malik hears it as it plops into the bowl of water-dirt-disinfectant solution. The antiseptic hurts more this time but Altaïr doesn’t relent, he’s painstakingly thorough in his cleaning.

Malik acquaints himself with the notion of needing stitching, he chews over how it will reflect on his future duties and work rather than dedicating thought on how much it will hurt (he had needed stitches before and he’s not thinking back to the sensation with a fond heart), it’s a sort of pain that doesn’t soften with years. He will be forced to be idle, and idleness for a man with the work habit in his bones is a tedious setback.

While Altaïr prepares the thread and needle Malik tugs at the pillow tassels nervously—another pull and they will tear off—he claws at the fabric, he expands his nostrils to dim his breathing but the expansion of his lungs and the rise of his chest is a telling traitor. It’s not that he won’t accept pain, it’s the waiting for pain that unnerves him.

“I have felt your eyes linger. On my body…” The warrior trails off in a misty voice perfectly content with his choice of words.

A different kind of cold sweat starts beading across Malik’s forehead.

It seems as if all windows have been tight shut, although it’s most certainly not so, yet the air is almost suffocating. And though it seems stuffy, it is none too warm. If he breaks into cold sweat now, Altaïr will see.

“You flatter yourself.”

“I call it observation.”

“I call it hubris,” Malik hisses stopping short. But it’s no use—the more he protests the more suspicious Altaïr will become.

His tone is indignant but it has made no impression. What an unenviable job, convincing a sharp-eyed man that the lumpy shape at the front of his breeches hasn’t been the result of his blatant staring.

“I am not blind. I saw the way your eyes pored over my body.” _The way your imagination touched it._

“You are prideful and arrogant, and all such men fall beneath the heel of hubris,” says Malik, relenting a little towards the end, as he’s started to feel that Altaïr is safely drifting out of whatever this conversation has been.

“Apologies,” the noble adds for some inane reason, peeking over his shoulder.

Malik is helpless. He’s told more startling lies than this. His frantic denial has eked out the bare existence of a dignity—he doesn’t need more than that at present. He will cheat humiliation a moment more, or two, and no longer than that.

Altaïr lets him change the subject and it’s a small mercy.

Malik fleetingly, innocently, peeks down his own legs and finds—to his utter amazement—that his cut is near sewn up.

Before he’s even noticed properly, Altaïr has stitched his cut. Perhaps this has been a sort of strategy. To have him distracted during the pain and have his attention distributed evenly. Quite impressive, how his attentions have shifted drastically enough to mute the pain of stitching.

“Go on,” he instructs Altaïr, and having said that, he turns his face back into the huddle of pillows to flick the tussles, and he keeps his face there throughout the remainder of the ordeal, lest there should be any doubt about who is accusing and who is being accused.

The next (and last) pierce-and-pull of needle he feels unambiguously, the sensation sends the hairs on his arms into a stand and his teeth into a vicious clench. Altaïr is listening to every little sound and he won’t give him the pleasure of hearing a whimper of his voice, despite his good deeds. Inwardly, he is screeching (about that he’s _never_ stared at anybody rather than that it hurts), but not a word of it is audible.

He doesn’t offer the smallest rudeness to his husband thereafter, he just ignores him. As though the man treating his injury doesn’t exist. Altaïr doesn’t feel insulted in any way, but merely disregarded. It’s curious how Altaïr ignores offered insult as soon as Malik’s anger falls below a certain level (even as his thankfulness doesn’t rise accordingly).

Altaïr cuts off the rest of the needle thread, he dabs off the blood, he cleans what has been soiled, he wraps Malik’s foot up the proper, soldierly way, he gathers his tools up.

“Try not to step on your foot too much. Rest and the wound won't have a chance to reopen. We’ll keep bandage until the wound scabs,” Altaïr advises while putting the bowl on the table, though he suspects Malik is already aware of what is to be done.

Malik doesn’t respond in any way at first, he swaps sides turning from belly to back, with the bandaged foot still stationed in Altaïr’s lap. He straightens himself refusing Altaïr’s offered hand, a little shaky and much concerned about their prior exchange.

There is a considerable amount of blood on the wiping cloth in Altaïr’s hand. The sight of blood doesn’t make him queasy, but the sight of glass shards, once he catches sight of them, stuns him and he loses himself in a meaningless tangle of surprise and awe. He beats curiosity and doesn’t pick them up from the bowl to measure their size, and in his awkward haste to evade thoughts of what’s been wedged into his flesh he ends up staring at the man who has removed the shards from his body.

Altaïr appears detached, as if waiting for Malik to decide whether he’ll rise from the sofa or not. He keeps his hand around Malik’s ankle as before, only his hold is less a chain and more a support. Malik’s sleek dark head is inclined, his scowling dark gaze shining up at Altaïr from under velvet eyebrows, as if Altaïr’s frankness and not his staring is the behavior that had passed all bounds.

That scowl is the last gasp of anger on Malik’s visage. It expires, and there’s silence on his face.

Altaïr has no talent for reading Malik. He has to apply to his sense of guessing to decipher what he thinks. Perhaps he’s aiming to further guard himself against Altaïr’s (justified) accusations, though the insecurity with which he defends himself makes his words obsolete. Altaïr juggles with the possibility of addressing the flaws of his defense or leaving it be, he is not overkeen to argue over a fact and he keeps his mute mirth to himself. To know that Malik finds him attractive enough to step on glass makes him feel less like a dead thing among living ones.

Unbeknownst to him, Malik is fighting different devils.

He should be thankful to this man for nursing his injury, and he is. Thankfulness crawls under his skin until it wants out of his body. Malik knows it immediately, that what he is about to do will make him uncomfortable and that he is advised by pride to modify his path—a thing which Malik is flatly refusing to do, telling himself finally that he will return to his older self after this short digression (which, eventually, he will).

Malik shifts, he pushes himself off sofa, then lower towards Altaïr, and at the same time when his balance is at stake and his mind is indecisive, he falls heavily across Altaïr’s legs, and Altaïr pulls him upright into his lap. Malik fidgets around for fidgeting’s sake before he establishes himself not far from the sitting spot where Altaïr had pulled him up to, one hand on Altaïr’s chest for leverage, the other on his jaw. He turns Altaïr’s head directing it streetwards, then he leans in crossing the gap between his lips and Altaïr’s cheek to leave a strategically well-placed kiss.

Malik retreats. For an instance he expects Altaïr to follow after him while he is leaning away. He regards Altaïr and looks sharp about it, as if to dare him to poke fun at the banality of the peck or to pinch his idea and kiss him back.

Altaïr sits with Malik in lap rewarding himself with his husband’s proximity. He sits in silence, quite fashionably dressed in a smile, he counts his takings and considers himself rich.

Malik feels Altaïr touch his hand, he sees him drawing it up to his lips, watches him placing a kiss his hands have grown used to already. He hasn’t interfered with Altaïr’s silence and he interferes even less with his gesture, yet his cheeks are steaming, and his own former gesture stinks horribly of sentimentality, but his effort is appreciated and his husband’s lips are warm on the back of his hand and he can forget that he has been embarrassed about it.

He sits in Altaïr’s lap until the papery flatness inside his chest dilates in depth till his heart almost bursts in response to the expansion. Then he lets his hand fall from Altaïr’s hold and stands up on wobbly legs to make himself scarce.

He pretends to not be in pain as he walks.

With a foot like this, he is unfit for the festival. But his glass figurine has fallen to crumble.

The signs are good.

 

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> The weather is getting cool and things are getting hot ~~and will soon get even hotter, if you know what I mean~~.
> 
> Also, the person this story was originally dedicated to isn't reading the story anymore so I unfortunately won't have any other art of gods which haven't been depicted yet (Sheker/Lucy, Zikaron/Desmond, Barzel/Rauf), but I'll try my best to describe them properly. 
> 
> For same reasons, I'm no longer obliged to keep all pairings, so if you think that I should cut out some pairing (except AltMal), I guess now would be a good time to discuss it since I can either revise future storyline or stick to the original one from October. I mean, I'm okay with keeping all current pairings. It would be less work to cut things out, but, again, I won't touch anything if you guys are already used to the pairings we have here.


	9. Chapter 7 - Part II

 

“You are a fool, Altaïr.”

“Then in good company, by the judging,” Altaïr quips, drowning soon thereafter what is his third cup of wine that Desmond has ordered. An elbow on table is keeping him from collapsing. He can take far more than three cups and his belly is full, but thoughts of his husband make him the only hunching figure round this table.

Desmond orders Altaïr’s fourth and their third round of drinks and Altaïr trusts him—Desmond is credited with good taste in alcohol and according to him this is arguably the best drinking place in the city.

“You must conceive of Malik as a young horse,” Ezio insists again stirring the topic stubbornly, “If you’re to achieve anything you must calm him first before getting into the saddle. A right tone can settle an entire argument. And try to smile occasionally.”

Altaïr had tried smiles on Malik and they'd blurred none of his scowls.

In the loose fist down in his lap, Altaïr is twirling a smallish eagle. A glass figurine given to him by a glassmith per request after the pyre had consumed all Dragons of the city. Ezio has received a hawk, Desmond asked for none. He wonders what it is on his face that made the glassmith craft an eagle. He regards the figurine with pride even when its confused warmth begins to fade and it starts to cool off in his hand. It’s almost too pretty to destroy. This notion bends his mind to other well-trodden paths and he thinks of Malik again.

Without Malik at his side, the festival has been nothing but ceremony for others, sweetened only by the many desserts on the market and the glow of pyre on a chilly night.

He had followed after his community inconspicuously, had helped unload their Dragon into the fire, had waited until the crowd thinned to ask for a glass figurine, all the while trying to put a cork on his mind which kept drifting back to Malik who remained among the very few left behind.

With Desmond exchanging hateful glances across pyre with that noblewoman he’s met on Al Mualim’s reception and Ezio drifting to and fro between them and Leonardo, Altaïr had left the invocation of Sheker’s warm winds to others who are prone to dance and drowned himself instead in all sweet that the festival had to offer. Between swinging back and forth between sweets and circling the makeshift stalls round the pyre like a vulture, Altaïr sampled whatever lavish desserts had been offered, more than he’s seen in the past seven years: fruit platters, candies, puddings, pastries made with honey, mint biscuits, rolls with fig paste, roasted chestnuts, stuffed dates filled with nuts, pine kernels and pepper, biscuits sweetened with wine, peach cakes brushed with honey and topped with poppy seeds, ring-shaped bread-pastry with custard, [Hiba](http://the-king-of-novices.tumblr.com/post/105028879746/live-forever-or-die-trying-the-pantheon-3-10)’s and [Nokem](http://the-king-of-novices.tumblr.com/post/104486337526/live-forever-or-die-trying-the-pantheon-1-10)’s eyes with various fillings, thin biscuits made from sesame seeds and dipped in honey—all of which he tried while Ezio and Desmond watched in unreserved horror.

Yet, once all sweets have been sampled, he couldn’t deliberately neglect other festival rites and he stood by the pyre flanked by his comrades, bothered by the undismissible fact that he could not find whether he belonged to a system of inclusion or circumscription, until Desmond put out the proposal to migrate to a drinking place not far from Barzel’s market up north, which is where they’ve spent the rest of their evening sitting undisturbed and wallowing in drink.

Desmond entrusts the new swill into his hand and this cup is honeyed wine. He knocks half the cup down his throat in a single swallow and puts it aground on weathered, wine-sodden wood with a tight hold on the cup, for balance. He sighs through a half swoon, he sees Ezio’s approaching eyes and narrows his own.

A race is run between Ezio’s next advice and Altaïr’s pulse to unburden (an easy winner).

“I don’t know what he wants from me,” Altaïr mumbles with a wine-swollen tongue and his verbal flowing teeming with sluggishness but he translates laboriously the thoughts from head to tongue at last, “All that I do, all that I _say_ , he turns against me. If I try to consolidate his interests to mine, I’m cruel. If do the opposite, I’m the oppressor. Nothing I say or do serves to bind him closer to me…”

There is a moment of silence in between the three in a place crowded by noise, and the two across the table wait obligingly while Altaïr drowns the remaining half of his cup.

“Have you tried telling him all this? Plainly?” Desmond suggests comfortably resuming the conversation.

“What do you think?”

“So, no.”

Untenderly, Altaïr fists his wrist around the cup, a pudgy frown crawls onto his face, it cracks between his brows heavily and shrinks before long. Confusion trudges up onto his face instead.

“I gave him everything,” Altaïr says staring into the barren state of his cup, or his marriage, “I saved him from certain death. I gave him shelter and food, I gave him all money that I had, every license to do as he desires with spoils I earned and he refused. I don’t beat him or force myself on him—what else does he require me to do? What by all nine gods does he want me to give him?”

“Altaïr, what is it you require of him?” Ezio asks, surprised, “You have what you wanted—he has remained loyal to you like an obedient dog. Was loyalty not what you wanted from him?”

“Yes. But I require more.”

“Sex?” “Love?” The warriors suggest in unison.

They read Altaïr’s face (and emphatically deny its expression) which has faithfully rendered not only his confusion at their questions but also confusion directed at the complex simplicity of his own desire.

“I want a husband.”

“So sex?” Ezio pointedly repeats.

“And love?” Desmond tacks on.

Altaïr is drunk. They all are.

Altaïr on Malik, Ezio on life, Desmond on disappointment, and none of them on wine.

Altaïr heaves both elbows up on the table. The wood pessimistically squeaks under his weight while he settles leaving his glass figurine upon lap, it protests as he sinks his forehead into the laced join of his fingers—this place is ancient, but so is its alcohol. Altaïr has no new drink to drown and he holds silence while Ezio and Desmond unanimously fill in the time by emptying their own cups. He doesn’t intend to answer posed questions, but the answers he tells himself prompt him to thought of his aspirations—how they used to look and how grotesquely they changed their shape—and this evolution of sense of himself is, in a sense, the evolution of nonsense. Of how nonsensical his expectations have been and still are.

“I try with all my strength not to look his way and see what I can’t have and never will. I try, but I’m weak… I fear my heart’s grown too large for him and my attentions have turned towards securing his affections.”

A task bound for repeated failure.

“Why do you hold him close if it troubles mind?” Desmond asks seeing how Altaïr cushions his forehead on the lace of his fingers and stares into his empty cup stubbornly. His intent is far from being meddlesome or urging to any particular course of action that could lead to divorce, but he watches Altaïr and he sees him riding on self-pity, and that’s a breed he knows intimately.

“He’s never evaded my sight,” Altaïr utters, low enough that they have to read it from his lips.

Desmond understands. He hopes Ezio understands, too. Altaïr has long been feeding off the thought of someone waiting for him back home, it’s how he had hauled himself through the war. By feeding on faith in a husband he can return to he fasted on the present, until his heart grew large just through this single expectation. Altaïr has been enamored with the concept of having a faithful husband that the very notion of losing this one person he had kept imagining is too abstract to swallow.

Desmond spends a healthy amount of time trying to conjure up a proper and polished advice so that this chunk of silence alone gives Altaïr license to carry on without expecting words, and then he says:

“He kissed me, earlier.” It is a silly thing to say, being bound to lead to questions, and Ezio (predictably) perks up at this.

“How was it?”

“On the cheek.”

Ezio’s face falls quick as a wink, “That’s not a real kiss.”

“It _is_ a real kiss!” Altaïr pops his head up before he bangs fists on table, the barren cups clink and clatter against wood. It’s the same face Desmond had seen directed at himself when they had returned from war, when he had poked at his husband’s faithfulness.

Altaïr is not a person who swoons or leaps absent provocation, unless this provocation is Malik.

“Alright, alright,” Ezio surrenders as a peace offering and Altaïr retreats cutting back on childish anger immediately.

Though it seems this brief exchange has gained one winner they both depart the battlefield as losers as Altaïr comes out looking like a wet mop. There’s silence between them, again, until the din of noises coiling around sneaks inside, between them, until Desmond deems it’s time to either split up or order another round, but Ezio wrestles the proverbial reigns from his hands swerving wide off-track.

“Altaïr, you’re a fool.”

“You’ve said that already,” Altaïr grumbles.

“No. I mean a different kind of fool. You’re not only right, you actually managed to hit the nail right on the head and completely miss the mark.”

Desmond remains entirely still, frozen like a field rabbit, hoping that Ezio will decide not to tell him whatever it is he intends, but Ezio leans in across the table to ensnare the man into this ruse, poor Altaïr hesitates.

“That kiss is like a little key,” Ezio tells Altaïr confidentially, as he offers him some of his own remaining drink, “Lovers are like a chest and when they give you the key they want you to open them. He’s pressed a key right into your palm and you made no use of it. He wants you to unlock him, trust me, I know his sort. You can take him if you want him—just use your key and he will open up to you like a budding flower,” the noble rattles off in excellent imitation of someone lecturing a person who has failed to manage their affairs in a sound, pushing manner.

Desmond cringes at the trinket Ezio is dangling before Altaïr’s nose.

He had intended to follow Ezio’s course of conversation stage by stage without overtaking him but he feels he should have been the one to steer the conversation even if it was bound from outset to miscarry. He doesn’t say a word from sheer sympathy with failure, for the sake of his friend who has applied himself to the task of convincing Altaïr into clutching firmly onto something Ezio himself has earlier named unreal. It’s all a deep error and Altaïr will see it as such, because how could he not—Altaïr has only recently been actually inaugurated into his marriage and he wouldn’t make such assumptions worthy of a true novice.

Yet, when Desmond turns to look at Altaïr, he finds the words already rooted inside him, he finds that Altaïr has heard every, every sound Ezio’s has just uttered.

“Altaïr…?” Desmond tries, itching to seize him by the shoulders to shake the idea off.

Altaïr’s control has gone dead. He stares slack-jawed at Ezio, he bats a series of bright-and-wide blinks, his attention doesn't even squiggle. No reception. Nothing. Desmond's words are not getting through, they are stones dropped into a bottomless hole, the hollow known as Altaïr. They fall and fall until they are too far away to be heard.

Desmond is one part anxious—the rest is anger. He had thought that Ezio’s usual babble about sexual conquest could be little more to Altaïr than a sad stylized toy, a bauble to be heard and unheard right thereafter, but Ezio’s words to Altaïr seem to be like a polished ring of copper, optimistically knocking at the front door of his comrade’s inner house. What Desmond doesn’t know is that Altaïr feels cheated. And the cheat is he himself for being as inept as to interpret Malik’s open invitation falsely. Altaïr finds it necessary to chastise himself for his incompetence, he doesn’t wonder how Ezio has known it immediately (the merest suggestion that his husband wants him destroys all curiosity), he is made uncomfortable through the fact that he had lacked the ability to figure out these subtleties himself, but all his rightful disappointment is soon razed to ground by one single sentiment—desire.

Altaïr’s nostrils flare for the briefest moment in that telltale pulse of lust Ezio’s had told Desmond about and Desmond has never seen, and Desmond sees him in an excited frankness he’s never set eyes on (and he has known Altaïr since the orphanage), sees that this flicker of nostrils alludes discreetly at what his entire visage is screaming—that he wants to leave this place urgently, or he will explode and all will spill out, into excitement that no cloth can sponge up from the floor.

“Go thrust the key home and don’t give voice to doubt, my friend.”

Ezio's words are like a slap to the side of the man's face and he jumps from the table and off into the crowd, as if unchained.

“Wait—!” Desmond starts, a meddler by necessity, but by the time he finds his voice Altaïr has already marched off to reap this fascinating new discovery, he has already sped towards the exit and disappeared off into the night.

“Just thrust your cock into his mouth and make sure to pull out before his jaw snaps shut,”Ezio says after him, to no one; he smirks, and folded into that sneer is a clipping of shameless malice, naively (or deliberately) exposed to Desmond.

“That’s kind of a dick move, don’t you think?” Before Ezio can even seize the crude but unintended pun, Desmond slaps his hand round Ezio’s own slamming the raised cup from mid-air down onto the wood where it spills over, “Ezio, he is presented crumbs and yet you offer him a fucking meal. You’re feeding him _nothing_ —”

“Have you ever wanted to avenge and hurt in revenge for wrongs done?” The noble cuts in, and his smirk is naught, his face frayed, pained.

“Yes. When I was ten.”

Ezio drops his head and glares into the contents of his cup without making to wipe his soiled hand. Desmond feels Ezio’s pain but he can’t forgive such shoddy treatment of a comrade for the sake of revenge on another (and Malik had been a child, the blame is not his, the blame is no one’s and everyone’s, and taking revenge on a child that has lost its family won’t bring his own dead family back from [Zikaron](http://the-king-of-novices.tumblr.com/post/119950551366/god-zikaron-patron-of-death-prophecies)’s hold).

“It’s dishonorable killing a friend while in your cups, so I’ll spare you.”

Ezio offers no answer.

Desmond doesn’t run after his friend to stop him because he knows that Altaïr has a visceral hate for the act of rape and that Malik’s protest, if offered, won’t fall on deaf ears.

 

* * *

 

Altaïr’s sprint back home is a blur of time.

He sights the spread of stars far up ahead only after he starts up the hill, he is aware of walking under their canopy only after he commences the long climb up the narrow, sloping street, and he loses sight of everything except his legs marching ahead, even the clutch of hand around the glass figurine, even the dark glare as he passes the street niche to the right where [Nokem](http://the-king-of-novices.tumblr.com/post/104486337526/live-forever-or-die-trying-the-pantheon-1-10) is scowling at him.

By the time he bursts through the entrance tunnel, he has already neatly planned his next move, the courtyard is quiet, with few people passing. In his haste he sees no one. He has a long and rewarding night ahead of him and the sooner he runs up the stairs and tunnel-stairs, the sooner he can start it. To kiss hands and hold lips, to make him scream then whisper, to fill their bedroom with moans and his chest with affection, to pet him, to give him all he’s asked for with that kiss, that key.

All of this he wants, and more if he can have it, and he barges inside clapping the door open—a hollow quiet greets him.

Inside—on the crossroads between the first room, the bedroom and the kitchen—there is a tub laid out, and he hardly needs any introduction to understand that Malik is bathing. Or, rather, he is in the closing stages of a bath.

It’s a cozy home bath, as opposed to the courtyard shower or city baths—the weather is too chilly for showering in the open, the baths too far away for injury. He shouldn’t have bathed at all, keeping his injury in mind. But he stands there inside a wooden tub tugged out into the spacious first room, with a cleverly-set stool inside the tub to rest his foot on.

His skin is wet from neck down, his body basking in the unearthly lilac light of his candle (it’s not the candles that burn lilac, Altaïr realizes belatedly, it’s the tinted glass of candle holders), wearing nothing but his dazzling youth, and a scowl. Altaïr’s gaze drops and soars snapping up an eyeful of his husband, and gluttons on every piece of naked flesh offered to it, leaving no place unattended.

Everything roars in Altaïr except lust.

There is a small, snug fire running in the hearth.

The room smells lilac, and dark, like fresh soaps and ancient gods. Altaïr sees [Nokem](http://the-king-of-novices.tumblr.com/post/104486337526/live-forever-or-die-trying-the-pantheon-1-10) until the thought is very hard to get rid of. Every part of Malik evokes his image. He thinks he can feel every piece that has ever made the god which seems to stand before him. His stance—proud and severe. His ominous mien. The darkness of his muted light, his dark purple. The blackness of his eyes ([Gdila](http://the-king-of-novices.tumblr.com/post/104486350666/live-forever-or-die-trying-the-pantheon-2-10)'s eyes, not [Nokem](http://the-king-of-novices.tumblr.com/post/104486337526/live-forever-or-die-trying-the-pantheon-1-10)'s own). Everything he used to fear as a child. He feels the outline of all these so precisely that they become solid images, in his eyes and breath, beneath his feet. He fears he might be squishing their shapes with his boots, or stepping on the edge of his robe.

Altaïr blinks, and [Nokem](http://the-king-of-novices.tumblr.com/post/104486337526/live-forever-or-die-trying-the-pantheon-1-10) is no longer there. Malik stands in his place.

A faint ripple stemming from Altaïr’s recent seizure of irrational awe is still scratching the inside of his chest while Malik holds his fascinated attention. It lasts only a few heartbeats and Altaïr blinks again—he is looking at Malik’s territory now, the land he has encroached on, he peers into his blue-walled, gold-flounced room and the slow scintillant of candlelight reflected through a silent-looking lilac glass, the ornamental utility of his bathing, which is not so much routine bathing as a sort of cleansing ritual so distinctly _Malik_.

Malik, an unpampered noble, a budding youth with the face of a god, with hardly a flaw to his full-blown, animated, not particularly well-groomed beauty of a scowl. And then—eyebrows up, eyes roaming—Malik examines the warrior as if he knows how much he had drank or, worse, why he has rushed here. A hundred ruffians cannot unarm Altaïr, but one scowl of an unarmed boy can control him, can turn him into the most docile, broken-spirited creature imaginable. None of this had been his intention, or choice; he had prepared to leash his husband and now he stands in chains.

Lust is still rattling at the back of his mind yet it's nothing but a distant jingle, too small to hold notice while he stands awed.

The silence fills in around Altaïr and Malik like insulation. The two watch each other (a stare and a glare) for a long while; all that the warrior can hear is the informal sound of a steady breathing as he basks in the smell of soft soap and scented oils and melted candle.

Nothing happens. Perhaps a moment passes or maybe a long while before Altaïr recognizes what he is staring at: an empty black hole. A husband who doesn't want him as Ezio has described. Perhaps Ezio has been mislead—Altaïr can't imagine there being some more or less villainous motive behind a comrade's advice. Perhaps he's fooled himself. It’s no one’s fault.

Altaïr would like to find someone to blame.

He blindly reaches behind his back and slowly shuts the door to stop the current of air which has taken advantage to trickle inside. His boots his unlaces without taking eyes off Malik, and by the time he shepherds himself leftwards, towards the sofa, Malik has already recommenced bathing in a manner quite cozy, quite casual, and Altaïr continues to breathe, slowly, so that the hum of his own breath doesn't drown out the sounds behind his back.

The path towards the sofa is so long that he feels as though he’ll never even reach the corner of it. One might think that lust and admiration would be equally balanced in a man who has rushed here to take his husband's virginity, but it is not so. Altaïr imagines that this conscience-ridden race between how badly he could have bungled it all and how sinful his assumptions have been is swelling inside him instead of lust. Perhaps that is why he's dragging himself like a beaten dog and why his footsteps seem not to be carrying him forward.

He doesn't stop even as he reaches the sofa, he seats himself in a swing mourning the loss of everything he has missed—the beginning of this ritual and every moment he has failed to catch during his journey to the sofa.

Altaïr sits but he is not there, his attention centered at this singular act of watching Malik while he himself dwells in the musty but familiar hole of unknown.

He is stuck in place, he isn't moving anywhere, he's touching no one tonight. Ezio’s balming words have missed their target like a misapplied salve but his wound is not cracking further—though watching alone will never suffice (and anything beyond that might be got only by begging), tonight it is, it’s breaking the law, and the sight of Malik is rotting his lust and swelling awe.

Altaïr doesn’t consider himself a lecherous parasite (he’s been celibate for seven years), nor does he think of himself as the ideal character (though he did, once), only that he is an ordinary human being and if he has (almost) done worse today than he has yesterday through violent lust, it is the result of other people and not the cause of his own choice, like on the first night with Malik. He has lived through a short burst of lust too cheap to mention and has given himself up to awe entirely, with the greatest relief.

“What’s the matter with you?” Malik asks. He has lowered his voice, he is calm.

“I was lost in a moment. Caught in a dream.”

“Then wake from it.”

Altaïr holds silent for the sake of unimportant important things Malik thinks nothing of. For the sake of little things which will wander away and perish if they refuse to let Altaïr have them, watch them, in peace.

“May I watch you?” He tries at last, after Malik doesn’t budge for a while.

“To what end?”

“Is the pleasure of watching not an end to itself?”

Malik is neither repulsed nor best pleased. There is a decent annoyance on his face before his wild black hair is brushed back with an angry brush, then there is a disjunctive motion—hands traveling apart and a half-shrug to signify helpless passivity. Of protest, there is no trace.

He resumes as if it’s no different than showering in the courtyard, and there’s (almost) nothing atypical in the essence of watching (except that it’s Altaïr and not the community) because nudity in current context irrelevant.

Altaïr settles on the edge of the sofa, and that’s the last of his movement. The rest he leaves to his eyes, his mind, his smell.

Around him, it smells of Malik’s proximity, of the mingle of a fresh clean scent of limes and velvety suppleness of peaches, of sputtering candles and melting wax. Of home. Of husband. He breathes this smell until it has replaced wine, until his lungs know no other scent. He sits intoxicated with it and enraptured by the sight before he feels himself drifting off—he loses sight of everything except the way his husband’s skin glistens with soap and his eyes with darkness, and suspicion. Malik plays pretense while he watches him from the corner of his eye as if Altaïr is going to tiptoe up behind him.

Altaïr feels he would fall flat if he tried to budge, let alone stand up. His eyes obey him, and beyond that—nothing. Malik does cease with the furtive looks at some point and Altaïr can watch him unchecked. He never ventures beyond admiration and exhaustive study of Malik’s habits, he never ventures into lust.

Malik’s skin is as dark as Altaïr’s, a shade darker, and beautiful. There are no scars. It’s smooth and supple skin, pliant where Altaïr’s is thinned-and-stretched taut over muscle, soft where Altaïr’s is hard, the curves of his body gentle where Altaïr’s are sharp. He is all Altaïr deems beautiful, and more than he had expected.

His skin is dark until he scoops up a palmful of _something_ from the bowl atop the bathtub’s tray panel on the side and works it into a lather. Malik starts out with his chest—Altaïr with his neck down. Malik seems to have a different pattern of soaping himself, and though Altaïr is fairly sure he had never quite dedicated thought to his own washing which is mechanical and thoughtless, Malik’s own motions appear deliberate—a well-trodden path he always follows. He is a creature of habit.

The first scoop he uses to spread the creamy, milky soap as a first coating, from there on he collects spoonfuls of measure to scrub and rub into skin one patch at a time until the bronze of his skin is muted by the thick froth and the pale, watery washing trickling down his limbs—a sight not tarnished by his words, but appreciated in silence.

The thick smell of limes bursts forth before he can rinse it off, it stifles the scent of peaches. Malik lathers himself up with hands, sans a washcloth or a bath sponge, and before Altaïr’s gorged himself full he moves to swill his body and rinse off to finish the bath (Altaïr should have been there to watch him soak, he regrets his absence). A bucketful of water, a pitcher, two deliberate pours—that’s all Malik needs to wash the lather off.

Time slows to a speed where Altaïr can notice every single thing. He notices Malik’s lean muscles—the sheen of candlelight patting down them—and his breath coming out of his flared nostrils, swelling his chest, stretching his belly taut, and the odd rhythm of drops as they ripple across water surface. Altaïr’s gaze is glued to the body that’s slowly revealed, shifting in a slow, monotonous climb up and down—he knows his body ought to be a darker form when bared in the wake of trickling soap (it's only natural, Malik’s skin is darker than lather) but it seems as if his skin is turning a few shades dimmer until it's dark as onyx and glossy as polished stone, until [Nokem](http://the-king-of-novices.tumblr.com/post/104486337526/live-forever-or-die-trying-the-pantheon-1-10) is standing somewhere nearby, Altaïr thinks, as a shadowy person whose exhales become Malik’s inhales.

Altaïr sees the gorgeous race of suds on this dark backdrop, he sees a current of milky foam, thick like felt, as it raps across knuckles where Malik is wiping his hand down his chest, he watches the struggle of a stream of soapsuds as it slows to a halt on the curve of his husband’s rear, warming itself in the flame of candle, and this moment of warmth, this beautiful pause in a moment of time is why, Altaïr feels certain, a jealous trickle of water washes from above, down the arch of Malik’s back. The warrior starts to swear, at the back of his mind, but slowly—everything is happening so slowly-and-quickly—and at first it seems time will come to a halt and the world outside this home will be all right. It seems as if it might even be possible to ignore that jealous trickle, but the foam is doomed to oblivion by the last invasive wave that swallows Malik’s back faster than a greedy thought. The foam is thinned, it struggles on, there can’t be that much distance before it hits the bottom. But there is. It’s not touching the surface. It trickles down the back of Malik’s thigh, down his calf by the time he pours his last pitcher of clear water across a shoulder, Altaïr hears it echo as it falls against the surface, in the same way he can hear the echo of Malik’s voice when he starts to softly hum, in the same way he can feel the echo of his own dream drowning among the soapsuds. He will wake up soon.

He rides the rest of the way in silence, except for the click of droplets, and the handsome deep voice of a youth, and the rush of Altaïr's warm pulse speaking over the hum of the melody. The melody whispers directly into Altaïr’s ear as if reading to him the the myth of marriage he used to conjure up in war, a dream that feels real for the first time, or unreal. It whispers a message that’s not dedicated to him and he can’t quite hear, though it fills him with longing just the same.

He has long invented images like these, when they had been herded into barracks and tents where no one even hopes to sleep well. There is no law or tradition to say that the beds in a barrack must be comfortable. The time spent where it’s all stuffy and noisy and the beds uniformly dirty and uncomfortable had been redeemed through expectations he used to construct at all hours of the day and night. There, in squalid dens and vagrant camps, Altaïr had imagined himself returning to cheaply-furnished rooms and finding himself rich with husband. He had imagined taking him, then taking him again, until Malik’s body is pleasantly exhausted and Altaïr’s sweetened by the pleasures of sex, and sitting by a fire on embroidered cushions, watching his husband bathe in candle light and suds and water.

His reveries have been made flesh, in part.

Malik is as far out of his reach as the moon. That his husband doesn't actually desire him despite Ezio’s suggestions is a knowledge acutely unpleasant (no humiliation can do more damage to a man's self-respect), but he has got so accustomed to it that he is not surprised.

He is absolutely without hope of getting a husband, and whether it’s Malik’s fault or Altaïr’s being unfit for marriage is no longer relevant. It’s his own fault for attaching himself to the wrong choice and being condemned to perpetual celibacy. A man like Altaïr, a man who has abstained for seven years will do another seven, or more, as long as he has a husband to watch and a hand to hold. Loyalty and comfort are enough to put him off starving. As long as Malik is within his sight’s reach, he will settle for what he has, or doesn’t have.

Malik climbs out of the bathtub stepping onto his bandaged foot first—an unfortunate necessity he handles well—and awaiting him on the carpet are two rectangular cloths of unequal size. A youth of his age should be permitted to forget something, but Malik has been painstakingly precise in his preparations. He fleetingly pats himself down with a prepared towel, he rubs himself into a fine sheen of lotion ignited by the gleam of candlelight, and though he struggles to reach the center of his back (perhaps Altaïr could one day apply an oil to his body, perhaps) he finishes his task with an immutable dignity which is accentuated, not undermined, by nudity. The bathrobe he dons has been neatly laid out on the table as well, part of his preplanned bathing ritual, a robe that is unmistakably Leonardo’s craft—dark, black, sleeveless, faced with gold that expands into a swirling pattern towards the center of the back. A black velour robe which does little to no job of covering his chest, a deep-purple breeches and blackcurrant socks next. Malik migrates to the smaller, unsoaked rectangular towel when he commences the task of slipping on and tying up his breeches—an airy piece of garment puffed up at knee and puckered below it—and pulling up his blackcurrant knee-high socks (Altaïr used to have many of them as a child) governed the vertical recurrence of a golden pattern.

When Malik has finished drawing his curious socks up to meet the breeches until the littlest strip of skin is covered, his bathing ritual is not done.

The one bowl on the tub tray is replaced by two new ones, a collection of bundles still lies unused on the table. Malik bends over the tub and bows his head to pour a fresh pitcher of water—he is washing his hair separately. Altaïr wishes he could further document the details of Malik’s hair washing, but the angle is different, and poor, and he is comparing the movement of Malik’s body to what he knows of hair care (and he knows very little). He wants to shift, he doesn’t want to move. He does not bother to puzzle out why exactly he feels the urgent need to dive into the particulars of his husband’s everyday life, but a flood of excitement foams up into his chest when he sees Malik rise, it’s as if he’s returned from a journey Altaïr hasn’t been able to follow.

Malik’s next bundles of cloth are even more curious. They consist of a layer of soaked linen (swiftly discarded), a thicker layer of absorbent cotton wound round his head, and another layer of tight, combed cotton coiled into a turban. The turban is as deep a purple as his breeches. At first it’s a long piece of dark cloth folded out across their dinner table. Malik treats it with greatest caution and reverence as he takes it up and begins tying it around his head. The coiling is slow and deliberate, mesmerizing. With no mirror at hand, Malik works the cloth up into a creaseless, neatly-folded turban of many layers, until nothing is left but to tuck in the top and lift his head. From the table he picks up the remaining bundle, he unfolds it and a burst of deepest black unfurls and flares up—it’s a hooded robe, the one Malik has worn on his way to his brother’s grave. Malik shrugs the robe on—a pinch of distance and it would touch the ground—he shirrs it neatly onto his shoulders and pulls the hood up without disturbing the turban. Though he requires a moment more to attend to his injured foot, he eases himself into his last garment—a pair of slippers, flat, soft, curly-toed, and of color Altaïr can identify as neither black nor purple.

Altaïr has never seen home garments of such beauty, nor a person more worthier of donning them.

Malik stands a living and breathing statue of his divine father.

“Has Nokem himself appeared in such rare form?”

Altaïr voices his question before he is aware of his mouth forming words, or his throat crafting sound to utter them. Malik glances his way (at last, after such an extensive amount of time), he frowns through the confusion-patched expression on face and Altaïr isn’t sure he’s heard him.

“[Nokem](http://the-king-of-novices.tumblr.com/post/104486337526/live-forever-or-die-trying-the-pantheon-1-10) stands eclipsed by your beauty.”

Malik blinks, the frown flattens leaving a disordered blank behind.

“You flatter.”

“I appreciate.”

Altaïr wonders if he’s crossed boundaries and damaged barriers he is learning not to touch. A moment passes, two, and Malik doesn’t appear as if he will lash out, no anger is filing out onto his face. He doesn’t acknowledge the compliment in any other way, as if it had never been uttered, as if it’s never passed between them. He distances himself as if Altaïr just voiced a sacrilege he wants no part in, and turns to collecting the residue of his ritual (bowls for sealing, soaked cloth for spreading to dry). The noble is not mad with anger, but this detail alone won't soothe the unease inside Altaïr's rib cage.

“I,” he starts, stuck, but then a flash of regret starts and Altaïr decides not to bother with the sublime clarification he was about to make. Instead he starts to laugh. His stomach feels alone and nervous. And then, in a moment of delirium, he takes the plunge:

“I would wash my hair like that, too.”

There is water left. He has seen Malik leaving his second of two buckets untouched. He wants to emulate what Malik has done, soaps, scents, and all.

The noble regards him with tireless scrutiny, quiet. Wet towels hang suspended on his arm thrust forth from the folds of his hooded robe, a bowl held in the hand that peeks on the neighboring side, and a dimmed glimmer of Malik’s skin where his belly is hidden in depths of the robe. With such concoction of images, it almost seems pointless to remind himself that he’s sharing a room with another human, not a god.

“I can do that in your stead,” Malik says cordially, without a ripple of scorn.

Altaïr has felt the words before he’s properly heard them. They feel like an avalanche stopping in its tracks a wisp of a distance above the cowering village. What Malik tacitly suggests is doing what a loving husband would do, and whether Malik is aware of it or not, Altaïr is easily overruled.

“Kneel,” he points at the spot beside the tub.

Altaïr leaps with disciplined efficiency, the rest of the way is not as easy, but equally headless. It’s a swooning motion—the result of feverish physical excitement—which he conceals with a blank face. Although he feels there must be something awry, that it’s dangerous to remain in touch with his imagination, he is comforted by presuming it’s only a passing kindness he is allowed to enjoy. An endearing gesture, but another returning of favors, like the kiss on cheek has been. One good deserves another. A returning of favors, it must be that. But Altaïr is not picky tonight, for this gesture alone is enough to sate his craving for domesticity. A token of care to put off desire for sex for months ahead. It’s not a sign of trust, Altaïr can’t imagine it as such, but it may be an initiation (or continuation ) of bonding.

He kneels on the carpet bending his head and neck over the bathtub—a tub completely different from the one he had left to a child—a tub whose ends slope up like an inverted arch, creating a much more comfortable leaning position for the warrior. He grasps at the rim, awaiting, keeping himself steady—he doesn’t trust his mind and his body even less—a man so entranced that he forgets about ever having rushed here with sexual pretext.

Nothing is sexual and everything is divine. The touch on shoulder when Malik maneuvers him into a more fitting position, the tug on collar as he wordlessly asks for Altaïr to remove his shirt, the fragrance of peach-lime- _peach_ that seems to waft off Malik the closer he moves.

He feels hot and buoyant, despite the cold as Malik’s hand hugs his forehead pulling him up. Malik is telling him he shouldn’t strain his neck before he gathers fresh supplies, it will suffice to wait on knees, and Altaïr nods, he doesn’t hear beyond the barest rudiments of simple orders. Malik may have been using the opportunity to check if Altaïr is feverish (he is not). The coldness of his hands feels good on Altaïr’s warm forehead.

He waits on his knees staring off into the tub and the sudsy water left in Malik’s wake, and from the adjacent room to the left (a sort of pantry he hasn’t ventured into it often, not beyond scanning its contents and taking a broom) he hears a loud anarchistic knocking—cupboards being opened and shut one after the other, ceramics clicking together.

Altaïr shakes himself from a distant haze when Malik emerges from behind the heavy drapery (the only border between the rooms Altaïr collectively calls pantry and their first room), with new items grouped together onto a tray, from towels to bowls Altaïr decides to examine as they become relevant. There is too many things to keep tabs on in chorus, they demand separate understanding. Malik allows him glimpse into none as he puts the tray up on the table, keeping only the sputtering candle on the tub tray.

Altaïr can bend his own head again, but he waits for Malik to do it.

He allows himself to be shepherded, steered, directed like a puppet, he is putty in Malik’s hands—the noble could stab a knife in his neck and he would keep his head down. The pitcher is submerged into the bucket, filled, picked up, the water is lukewarm—just right. Water flows down his head and his chest is full to overflowing. He is unsure what to do with his hands, where to place them, he makes a stunned pause and then coils his hands round the bath rim. Though he would best like to lay his arms out along the rim and lace hands below chin, he is keenly interested in the contents of Malik’s cosmetic treasures, and such position would hinder his sight.

Malik doesn’t simply hang over this task on a distance, he works his left hand thoroughly through Altaïr’s hair, short as it is, his movements aren’t chaste nor shy—in fact, Malik had never touched him more on his own volition. They don’t talk; there is a great famine of words. It doesn’t impair the experience, to the contrary. Altaïr knows there is conversation even where people are silent. Malik has no ulterior motives, he has nothing to gain from him, and this is Altaïr’s greatest obstacle to puzzling out the reason behind such kindness, but he knows, at least, that this is not as silent as it looks.

Malik visits his tray only after Altaïr’s head is thoroughly soaked. Malik does set his first bowl onto the tub tray little to Altaïr’s right (it’s one of two Malik had used) and he is pleased. He doesn’t expect Malik to acquaint him with the contents of each bowl, nor does Malik fulfill the expectations he doesn’t have. A glimpse into the vessel flashes him a summary of its contents. What he can’t decipher through mere sight, he leaves to his nose. It’s a combination of soap, perfumes, and essential oils, a concoction that holds his attention until Malik’s cold hand confronts his neck turning his head away, and then down. The contents of this bowl are what gives off such a strong scent of peaches and lime. This, and whatever Malik had washed his body with.

Altaïr expects him to finish soaping his hair as efficiently as he has oiled his body, but the time he spends on this task violates all boundaries of Altaïr’s expectations. Malik collects a dollop of this concoction at a time, he doesn’t scoop it into his palm in great quantities. The lathering itself and working his way into his hair lasts more than Altaïr is able to count (he makes an honest attempt to count, but each drag of fingers across his scalp sweeps what little sense of time he has), and at the outset Malik is a smidgen rougher, his hands a little brisker, until the soap begins sudsing up, until he can hear the rush-and-crinkle of foam. Calling it soap wouldn’t do it justice—it’s far from the stuff Altaïr has been used to in longer than just the past seven years, far from the soap that had been difficult to wash out and had left behind a dull film after washing. Ezio managed, occasionally, to pilfer soaps of better quality for his hair, but Altaïr had never asked (he saw no need), and Desmond kept his own even shorter. While Altaïr did groom himself (to the best of his ability) to maintain cleanliness, Malik’s ritual is not the pinnacle of cleanliness, but pampering so typically civilian, or noble.

Once he thinks his hair is fully lathered and Malik is ready to rinse, Malik turns his attentions elsewhere; he swaps vessels bringing with him this time more liquid contents in another bowl. Scented oils. Cedar and olives. Perhaps it’s this that makes his husband’s hair smooth, like silk, as opposed to Altaïr’s hair—it’s thick, it’s coarse.

Malik disappears off into his pantry. It seems he hasn’t come as well-prepared as Altaïr has thought him to be. He lays no blame on him. It must be excitement or spontaneity, inventiveness or the novelty of this sudden situation that has muddled his usual precision. He returns with another towel, another cloth (white, not dark like Malik’s own), and though Malik emerges through the drapery with ease, it flutters in his eyes long after it sways to a halt and Malik bends his disobedient head lower again.

“Do you think we need a door there?”

At his side, Malik is scooping a spoonful of the oils mixture from the bowl and slotting the spoon above the candle flame for warming.

“No,” Malik says, his tone far from decisive—the tone of someone prepared to compromise should it come to that, ”I thought about doors once. But they are too costly. I like it the way it is.”

“And between here and the bedroom?”

They sit in silence for a while, Altaïr resting on his haunches bent over the rim of the tub, Malik swapping the spoon’s contents with colder ones to heat above flame.

“No,” Malik decides after the extensive pause, “Without doors it’s as if the entire house is connected into one unity.”

Malik turns silent anew and Altaïr helps him carry that silence, he’s content with watching him warm the oils, with listening to the foam suds in his wet hair wither slowly until Malik decides it’s time to free it from its suffering.

It’s when Malik stirs the bowl for the last time and picks the pitcher up again that Altaïr decides to whisper what he hasn’t known he’s holding in chest.

“I’ve a suspicion we will need doors for the bedroom.”

Altaïr hopes his inkling hasn’t met a suspicions ear, as his thoughts moved closer towards matter of cold and winter, and Malik (to Altaïr’s relief) doesn’t catch the wrong message. With pitcher in hand, he makes a relinquishing gesture, a half-shrug before he envelops Altaïr’s nape to bend him lower.

“If you want doors you can have them put up. Though I would advise against such costly spending, this is your house.”

Through the amalgam of water washing down his head and Malik’s rubbing down his scalp to rinse him off, Altaïr nearly fails to catch his last sentence. When he’s sure he has heard it right, just as he is maneuvered up through pressure on forehead again (once a towel has been swathed around the back of his head), he bursts into an impromptu and completely disorganized laugh. Short as it is, it makes Malik frown and Altaïr regret his own reaction. He wants to say something, to leave a remarkably well impression with words he’s intended to say, but he waits for Malik to towel his hair off properly.

“The walls are mine. The home is yours.”

Above, a human god is peering down at him, with wet towel in hand and silent turmoil on face.

“No doors then,” Malik issues the final verdict, and then there’s quiet.

He migrates to whatever step he’s planned next, quickly—Altaïr feels it’s to obscure the real question of what’s just passed between them, of how close to domestics they have just ventured. Malik keeps him on his haunches, he comes up behind his back with bowl in hand, and before long Altaïr feels a faint dripping of warm oils across the crown of his head, then Malik’s fingers combing through and working the mixture into his scalp. It lasts quicker than Altaïr has raised hopes for, too quick—it’s a blink of time, a morsel for a man starved for domestic care—and Malik is bending him over the rim once more and repeating the rinsing while Altaïr mourns the loss of his touch.

A new towel is wound around his head as a poor imitation of Malik’s turban, he isn’t sure what follows next (if anything at all), but Malik taps at his shoulder and orders him up. He obeys.

“Sit,” he says pointing at their cushioned bench. While he’s taking a seat Malik tugs his tray over, takes a third bowl. This one Altaïr hasn’t seen yet. The contents aren’t in accordance with the size of the bowl which appears almost too large for a palmful of substance that looks like some creamy ointment, whitish in color, smelling of something Altaïr can’t quite band with any scent from the catalog he’s familiar with—he wonders if it has any other purpose than smelling good.

Malik puts this vessel before him, and two before Altaïr.

One of them Altaïr recognizes instantly as Malik’s double-nozzled oil lamp, the other is a censer. The lamp he has seen already and the censer holds his undivided attention. It’s silver cast, spherical with a round rimming in the center where it’s split in half—the lower half fretted, the upper elaborately engraved, both enameled. The upper half, which makes the lid, grows into a ribbed cone on top, cast in gold. Another heirloom. Altaïr wonders how many treasures of his home this child has saved from fire and theft.

Malik takes the candle to light each of the two peeking lamp wicks, then puts out the candle. From the kitchen hearth he returns with a glowing ember in tongs, he breaks it into halves inside the censer, and then he collects a few kernels of incense from a lidded box he’s slotted onto his tray and peppers this pinch of yellowish dried incense resins atop the embers. A volute of smoke fans out almost immediately, the scent of incense spreads around them mingling with silence. It’s incense that can lull one to sleep.

Altaïr struggles with himself, he would ask questions but he needs volume in his voice, and both are missing equally. He would ask about Malik’s childhood, about the days after his departure for war, he would ask about all the items and oils he’s seen and will see tonight, but the silence between them is stout and heavy, and he devotes himself to watching and stalks Malik’s hand as it picks up the tiny golden rod connected by chain to a fastener like a large articulated ring atop the censer lid, he watches him muffle the smoke while fitting the lid into place.

When he had been but a child little above a toddler, Altaïr had asked a priestess why the incense doesn’t burn on its own. She had said, he remembers her words well, that it’s the duty of priests to burn incense, to remind them that just as the censer cannot be lighted without our hand, so too cannot our heart—it, too, is our inner censer, which can’t be ignited without a light, as many virtues as it may contain. Because our virtues are like fuel, and the light the spark that ignites them.

This old lesson has never echoed as loudly as it does now. Altaïr understands it as good as he used to, which is to say not very well, but he has rediscovered it and it’s at least one step closer to unraveling its full value. _Give him breath and tinder until it ignites_. _Find an ember of light in him and give it breath, and he will glow for you_. Leonardo’s words sound like that of a priest. Malik is the censer that can’t be lighted without Malik’s own hand, but it rests on Altaïr to provide the spark to light his virtues.

Altaïr had spent his own childhood torn between the cheer of [Hiba](http://the-king-of-novices.tumblr.com/post/105028879746/live-forever-or-die-trying-the-pantheon-3-10)’s orphanage and the silence of [Gdila](http://the-king-of-novices.tumblr.com/post/104486350666/live-forever-or-die-trying-the-pantheon-2-10)’s temple across the street. The scent of incense evokes memories of hours he had spent in the presence of priests, and calmness he had found near [Gdila](http://the-king-of-novices.tumblr.com/post/104486350666/live-forever-or-die-trying-the-pantheon-2-10)’s statue, in the shadows of his wings. He hasn’t prayed to [Gdila](http://the-king-of-novices.tumblr.com/post/104486350666/live-forever-or-die-trying-the-pantheon-2-10) since his return. How conceited, to forget his patronage the moment the dangers of war have ceased. He vows to visit the temple tomorrow. Perhaps he won’t find any priests he remembers, perhaps he won’t find any. This thought, or fear, fills his head and holds its place in his chest for a while, before his attention is summoned by Malik.

It’s not an action of Malik’s own choosing. It’s what Malik is doing that’s pulling Altaïr’s head from graver thoughts. And Malik is currently piling in front of him a handful of what looks suspiciously like seeds of some tree, or herb. He takes up seed by seed digging his nail into a part where the skin is the thinnest and more susceptible to breaking, he splits the pit removing the brownish husk with white flesh inside, and in the very heart of the pit—a green seed. He splits and removes each husk leaving only the green seeds on the table, he tugs his bowl of ointment over, and then starts cracking the green seeds in two (the seed is small, the work is delicate) and pinching each half into the bowl, until the moist sap inside is squeezed out in the form of a droplet. This procedure, delicate and deliberate as it is, suggests to Altaïr a practiced use cosmetic routine (in same ways Malik is protecting his hands from harsh soaps, in same way Altaïr is starting to heal his own hands), yet Malik never once show signs of wanting to explain the procedures to Altaïr, nor to explain the contents of his mixtures, not to speak of their origin. Perhaps it’s herbs for nourishment of hair, perhaps it’s nothing but an unconventional perfume.

Malik offers nothing and Altaïr asks for nothing.

He breathes incense and waits for Malik to stir his newest concoction; some words want to leave his mouth, and he gulps them down, everything’s swimming a little in the smoke of incense and the radiance of Altaïr’s happiness as he realizes that Malik has risen and taken place behind his back to work this mixture into his hair. Perhaps this is what provides Malik’s hair with such luster, which makes it soft to touch. He doesn’t think of speaking when Malik removes the towel from his head, even less as he begins to dab drop after drop across his scalp before putting the emptied bowl aside.

Having freed his hands, Malik combs them through Altaïr’s hair from nape up, and, having arrived at the crown of his head, he starts kneading his palms into his skin and clawing up and down—more soft tips than claws—and raking his fingers through Altaïr’s drying hair. The mixture is subtly warm on Malik’s finger when he tilts back his head a sliver and runs it along his hairline, precisely, without smearing a drop on his forehead, then his hand retreats joining with the other one and rubbing until Altaïr realizes that this is not finished with mere application of his mixture, but followed by a scalp massage.

While at first his hands work with a quaint blend of vigorous strokes and lighter pressure, his touch turns invariably mellow after a time (Altaïr has, once more, lost touch with the notion of time—it could have been a few moments or a few hours) until, at last, he is rubbing with his fingertips, gently.

It’s gentleness in hands that’s hard to reconcile with the harshness of Malik’s character, the severity of his scowls.

He has felt friendly touches of much briefer duration, but he hasn’t been touched this intimately, nor has he ever allowed others to map out his body with such precision, to chart and travel the unevenness of his scalp and feel the scars littered across it— the old gash at the back of his head, or the other, thicker but shorter one above his left ear where Malik glides his little finger ever so often when he combs through the sides of his head.

Altaïr feels tension forsake him; the rest of him is breathing, slack muscles, and dormant confusion.

He is used to his nomadic state of confusion, but he wants to know why Malik is doing all this. To prove that he does his jobs and tasks thoroughly? Has there been some merit to Ezio’s words after all? Has Malik simply discovered pleasure in taking care of someone as he takes care of himself? Is it out of a personal sense of accomplishment, either from doing his tasks skillfully, or bringing a poor warrior to the climax of confusion? Or another swap of favors for his bandaged injury? Repayment of obligations doesn’t feel like this. It shouldn’t. It’s a fraud if it is repayment.

Altaïr will forget this suspicion now, but will remember it afterwards.

Now, the smoldering ember is glowing brighter and the flame is burning harsher, the smoke is fanning out quicker, and his home smells of warm oils, and spices, and peaches, and Malik. The pressure on his scalp is firm and fingers gentle, skating in shapes Altaïr can’t decipher, and he’s trying to look for genuineness in what Malik is offering but he’s swallowed by such a fierce delirium much too quickly—he is going, going, he will be gone in a few more breaths.

He follows for a moment more as Malik flicks his earlobe by accident and starts a brisk rub with the balls of his palms climbing towards the midline of his head, he can’t follow further than that, he’s gone.

The next time he opens his eyes, the mist of smoke is haloing above the cense in thin swirl, two gentle thumbs are curving down his temples, the back of his head is tilted backwards. He is unaware that he’s leaning back until he feels that Malik is keeping the weight of his head on his bare chest. Malik is not pushing him up but he has opened his eyes and honor demands that he raise himself upright. This movement alone unleashes a series of complaints in his body and shrill protests in his mind, but Malik’s fingers are still on his temples and things could have been worse.

Once his head is propped by his own neck again, Malik launches into a slow retreat, across his hairline and backwards towards the midline of his head (he feels no creamy texture, his hair is dry) and, starting from the crown of his head, he climbs down the back of his scalp in small, circular motions that mutate slightly with each new rub down, whether it’s a pressing of his whole hand against his scalp or moving his skin with the heel of his palm, without friction.

He retreats gliding down Altaïr’s nape with the knife edge of his fingers, down the sides of his neck fanning out onto his naked shoulders, and before Altaïr can register properly, Malik has taken up a seat at his side, facing Altaïr rather than the table, with one leg propped up onto the bench and a sole of his toe-curled slipper wedged against his own inner thigh.

Altaïr is alert and his mind rapt when Malik lifts himself upright to reach the back of his head with towel in hands and dabs him off to remove the extra moisture (though there’s none). Keeping his eyes closed is what seems to encourage Malik to maintain proximity, and Altaïr is therefore encouraged to keep them closed. The towel is replaced by a hand, to slick his ruffled hair down, and it’s when Malik does whatever he’s intended next that Altaïr feels his closeness through sense of hearing as the robe shirrs down Malik’s shoulders or sense of touch as the warmth of his skin reflects on Altaïr’s own, and finally through sense of smell, when he leans in (not towards Altaïr, at least not deliberately, but across the table to reach for something behind Altaïr’s back) and he can breathe the scent of peaches and warmth from Malik’s chest.

This innocent proximity to his husband’s chest nudges to life what’s been caged and dormant, it whets his appetite but he puts himself to fasting and waits until Malik has wound a garment around his shoulders to open eyes. It’s a bathrobe, white as flour, plain in comparison to Malik’s attire, but soft to touch, and thick. Altaïr shifts on the bench to face him, until Malik’s bent knee is touching his inner thigh, and with a jerk of his broad shoulders, Altaïr loops his arms through both armholes at once; another pull and the robe is on. Malik leans in again (he is invasive in ways he criticizes Altaïr for, but Altaïr won’t tell him that, not now), reaches behind his neck to tug up the hood that has escaped the warrior’s notice, and then pulls it down Altaïr’s head.

They sit in a whirl of incense, two husbands in hoods facing each other on a table bench.

It seems to Altaïr that the more fervently he tries to conquered Malik, the more he is conquered by him.

“Thank you.”

“It was nothing,” Malik evades.

“It was everything I wanted. More than I thought I’d get.”

Malik’s hands remain clawed in folds of his (now Altaïr’s) white hood for a moment longer, as if he’s caught himself unsure why he’s placed them there or why he hasn’t removed them by now, then he releases his hold pulling his hands down.

Altaïr catches this imperfect fall of hands in midair seizing him by the wrists, he draws them up to his lips and resolves the pardonable tension with an overly familiar kiss. He kisses knuckles, he nuzzles lower. He has other, more ambitious plans, but for time being he keeps Malik’s hands in between his and cushions them on his lap. A smile that has furtively settled on his mouth is reluctant to part from its hard-earned territory and Altaïr doesn’t chase it off, he isn’t even sure he’s capable of doing so, it remains there for reasons that are known or less known to him.

He would love to lean in and dive into the shadows of Malik’s dark hood to capture his lips, for the briefest kiss if more is not allowed, just to remind himself of the taste of his lips, but he ditches all desires. He has made himself a votive promise to never cross boundaries again. Even if all this has been a form of odd invitation on Malik’s part, he won’t read it as such. Seeing nothing in this might be absurd, but no precaution he takes is too absurd if he wants to pave the way to a better bond with his husband.

He feels the bulk of Malik’s silence on his shoulders, he feels it ooze down into the crook of his arms, he can’t lift his hands.

If Malik’s words are weapons, his silence is murder.

Malik is unfit to look him in eye outright at such proximity (he’s ashamed to consider this a weakness) and his gaze soon drops, to Altaïr’s lips, where he’s in even worse danger of being misunderstood, so he veers off to the side. This doesn’t last even for two breaths, since it’s a gesture too unsubtle and vain, so he restores his gaze to the former sight. He has been obvious and Altaïr is singularly bad at pretending he hasn’t noticed, and Malik finds it difficult to care because he sees bright eyes, the healthy bronze glow of cheeks, full-but-papery lips. His husband’s eyes are actually of a light transparent amber with contrasting black lashes, his eyes are a bit glassy as Malik starts to slant forward before he’s aware that he’s leaning in—a baffling motion freezing a seasoned warrior in place.

Malik arrests himself in time, he stops dead, he is so hopelessly incapable of handling the absurd predicament he’s found himself in. Too thoughtless in start, too nervous to continue.

There is a fatal split between what he has started and how he wants it to end, and where a blush is clutching at his temples his turban swallows it up, but it can do nothing about the glow that has suffused his cheeks. His lips part, he’s too timid to wet them, he keeps them parted, he breathes stiffly; Altaïr suspects Malik won’t even start to consider a kiss until he’s got rid of certain prejudices, and the time Altaïr needs for breaking them can’t fit into the gap that currently hovers between them.

Malik stares at him perplexed as if he expects him to do something or undo what he himself has started, and Altaïr (through no conscious decision of his own) stares at the little upward lift in the middle of Malik’s upper lip, it’s diverting Altaïr’s attention, it’s enchanting him.

Though Malik has not been able to clinch the business, he’s brought himself to a satisfactory _close_. Though he isn’t sure if that’s what Malik has intended, he would be remiss to leave this attempt without a closure. Though he might be perceiving this in the shimmer of his usual imaginary nature, it seems to Altaïr that Malik has acted unconsciously but deliberately enough to give him a hint.

Altaïr isn’t fond of hints; he had taken very blinkered attitudes before, assuming that Malik wants him, so rather than assuming that Malik’s dropping of hints is an invitation between his legs, he assumes it’s an invitation to bonding.

Malik is frozen in mid-path, he’s not budging anywhere, and though the sight of him bathing had earlier completely dispelled lust from his body, or made it unnoticeably dormant, the sight of Malik’s dark eyes and warm wet breath stirs his desire until the jingle of lust that has been dimmed before now rattles louder.

He will travel down the path Malik has started. It’s only a rough idea, and there are some obvious objections to it. Nevertheless, the fact that it’s been Malik who made the first gesture suggests a way of improving relations between them without piling up new burdens on Altaïr alone.

His palm guards over Malik’s clasped hands, he smiles, and when his smile is not sufficiently clear he leans in into the vacancy between them to pinch the gap. Little by little he follows the slow path of suspense, but suddenly Malik tilts his heads downwards before Altaïr’s lips can catch him, and Altaïr comes to a startled halt, but having found himself this close he gaps the bridge and pecks his forehead as a sweetener. He retreats leaving Malik to stare at their twined hands.

“I won’t kiss you,” Malik insists while peering up to catch a glimpse of Altaïr’s face.

“Alright.”

“You’re a strange man,” the noble says flatly refusing to look him in the eye ever since sighting the smirk on Altaïr’s lip while the warrior is squeezing his hands tighter.

“Probably.”

Malik doesn’t look; he demands no release either.

 

* * *

 

Altaïr is already in bed before Malik has finished his prayers.

It looks as if [Nokem](http://the-king-of-novices.tumblr.com/post/104486337526/live-forever-or-die-trying-the-pantheon-1-10) is praying to himself.

It’s colder than all previous nights together and Malik has dug out a cotton blanket from his wooden chest, a velvet duvet cover, and a thicker down quilt—this one is not split in half. While Altaïr rejoices in the newfound unity of their bed, he had hoped (childishly) that Malik would seek to secure his body warmth, if chances would have it, theoretically, in Altaïr’s proximity, that he would seek to transfer warmth from Altaïr’s body.

When Malik climbs into the bed he climbs standing upright, to select a book from his wedge-shaped shelf towering above their bed. He takes a long time to nestle into the bed—to lay his robe out across sheets, to plump his pillow up and recline backwards and put his booklet up—and longer to amass on enough warmth to let his arms escape the protection of covers for longer and longer while perusing his book.

Altaïr would offer warmth (he’s abundantly supplied with it), but he has sworn to never again cross Malik’s side of bed, nor does Malik invite him over.

The warrior lies on his side facing the other half of the bed and its inhabitant, and he sighs a lime to the accompaniment of crepitation that Malik’s leafing through pages evokes. Malik doesn’t acknowledge his sigh of defeat, nor anything else beside his little booklet. Sleep is beginning to claw at the insides of Altaïr’s head and he finds his voice, through fear of losing a luxury he has taught himself to expect.

“Malik…?”

Malik doesn’t wait for the question.

Without taking his eyes off the book, he drops his arm asprawl towards Altaïr’s side of bed and his hand unfolds blooming from a fist into a spread palm waiting for Altaïr’s hold. He draws his knees up to erect a support for his booklet and ease the task of turning the pages over single-handedly.

Altaïr honors his sacrifice.

He takes the hand up with deepest reverence. His hand is motionless, his fingers don’t give the barest twitch, as if he has given up control and left it in Altaïr’s undivided care. Altaïr shifts closer, to avoid pulling Malik’s arm taut across the mattress as he seeks to put lips to his hand. He draws across the creases on his palm absentmindedly, conjuring up memories of his husband’s bath, he thinks of fingers in his hair and pecks each knuckle blindly, with admiration. He can’t forgo the comfort of this hand, and he would give up all to never part with this luxury.

He holds onto it despite the clench of sleep, his mouth is meshed into the mound of Malik’s palm, he thumbs across soft, satined skin.

His fingers whisper, his lips stroke. He drifts off breathing the scent of lime and peaches off Malik's hand.

 

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> ~~I'M SORRY FOR ALL THE SAP OH GOD~~
> 
>  
> 
>  
> 
>  
> 
> Prepare your panties for the next chapter.
> 
> I'm not sure when I'll start it, but prepare your panties. 
> 
> A short note regarding the pairings thing: though I won't change anything, I'll just limit the M-rated stuff with DesLucy since there doesn't seem to exist interest in tackling this one, but nothing else will actually change.


	10. Chapter 8

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Just to be clear: this chapter has graphic parts and if you’re not into that sort of thing I’m truly sorry for putting you through this — it actually wasn’t my initial intention but this story never listens to me. I’ll really try to limit myself next time. And to those of you who are into detailed touching and all that jazz, I can only say please enjoy.

 

“I had told you before they wouldn’t aid in the killing. Had you heeded my warning none of this would have happened—“

“They’ve seen war, I had thought—“

“They’ve seen war— _abroad_. This is their community. It’s what they’ve been brought up to protect.”

In a parlor choked with ornamental plants, Al Mualim stands cupping the rounded end of his beard in a time-worn hand and stroking the grey tangle while the report dangles from his other hand. He ponders. He doesn’t inspect the parchment in hand and trusts Lucy’s word alone.

“They’ve already broken your rules once. That they would break them again shouldn’t astonish you,” Lucy worms himself into his silence and finding him receptive to her tales takes off a lot of the workload she had expected to perform to convince him.

“Was there nothing to prevent their intervention?”

He is receptive, but displeased. While the massacre of priests remains undiscovered and their reputation spotless (were it not for the trio who directed the burial from sea to land), Al Mualim is dissatisfied with the presence of evidence, however deeply interred, on soil of the island they intend to conquer under their rule.

“They are too strong for me to confront with violence,” she admits and this, at least, is not a lie, “The mercenaries that were present are but a weak force compared to experience of warriors. There was nothing I could do without paying in blood. Blood would have breached their silence, and their silence none of your rules can govern.”

Within certain limits, it is actually true that the less excuses Lucy has, the less she worries. When she has a dozen excuses to choose from she is liable to the most craven anxieties. When she has only one she is quite indifferent. Yet she’s covertly relieved that Al Mualim has accepted her only excuse for altering his orders in his absence.

“We must change rules then. Children might be a good way to start. Reeducating citizens into new laws—“

“Your laws are not yet _law_ , Rashid,” she all but snarls, and without a pause she shoot a warning across, ”I’m telling lies in your name. But my lies are expensive.”

She has been in the position to pawn her lie to Al Mualim for many more she will tell in his name.

She might have snuffed one fire but opened the way for a pyre, yet for as long as she has a breath of power within herself, she will direct the pyre elsewhere and prevent other massacres—of teachers, of warriors, of civilians.

Lucy knows someone else who had lied to get their way.

And it’s not merely the method of Sheker’s ways that inspires awe in Lucy, but the craft of her deception equaling that of [Masekha](http://the-king-of-novices.tumblr.com/post/106253964456/live-forever-or-die-trying-the-pantheon-5-10).

It had not been Ga’ash to deceive [Gdila](http://the-king-of-novices.tumblr.com/post/104486350666/live-forever-or-die-trying-the-pantheon-2-10) into alliance. Ga’ash gives orders, Sheker sees them fulfilled. And in seeking to help Ga’ash defeat [Nokem](http://the-king-of-novices.tumblr.com/post/104486337526/live-forever-or-die-trying-the-pantheon-1-10), Sheker had set out to form alliances with other gods who would help subdue this new god of vengeance, though it had not been a god who was seduced into an alliance first, but a human.

One she saw descending down to earth of their island in the form of an eagle. A human from elsewhere, unrelated to [Nokem](http://the-king-of-novices.tumblr.com/post/104486337526/live-forever-or-die-trying-the-pantheon-1-10)’s offspring, crafted by another god from far away. And Sheker knows her targets well; she knew, right away, that a god would make their human children shape-shifters only to better suit them to their environment. She knew that the landscape this human came from must be wrinkled with steep mountains and deep canyons, and it had behooved his creator to shape his children into both bird and man, to traverse his hilly ground with more ease.

It was Sheker who knew that the creator of this winged human is a god of stone and mountains—like Ga’ash. It was her, not Ga’ash, to convince winged [Gdila](http://the-king-of-novices.tumblr.com/post/104486350666/live-forever-or-die-trying-the-pantheon-2-10) that Ga’ash is the creator of his shape-shifting folk (even though Ga'ash never possessed the power to do so).

It was Sheker, not Ga’ash who deceived [Gdila](http://the-king-of-novices.tumblr.com/post/104486350666/live-forever-or-die-trying-the-pantheon-2-10) with honeyed words and promise of reward, with evil tales about [Nokem](http://the-king-of-novices.tumblr.com/post/104486337526/live-forever-or-die-trying-the-pantheon-1-10)—of his endless fury that strikes whoever dares encroach his island, of [Nokem](http://the-king-of-novices.tumblr.com/post/104486337526/live-forever-or-die-trying-the-pantheon-1-10) as an arrogant and ungrateful spirit intimidated by Ga’ash’s power, of Nokem who made himself a ruthless tyrant that flourishes on meals of bone and blood.

It was Sheker who saw [Gdila](http://the-king-of-novices.tumblr.com/post/104486350666/live-forever-or-die-trying-the-pantheon-2-10) for what he was—a fearsome warrior but prideful human who needed to measure his skill against a worthy challenger—and made him attack [Nokem](http://the-king-of-novices.tumblr.com/post/104486337526/live-forever-or-die-trying-the-pantheon-1-10) in their name with little effort.

And it’s not only the method of Sheker’s ways that inspires awe in Lucy, or the craft of her deception, or the sharpness of her eyes, but also the lasting marks that her sweet words leave on those who are seduced by them. Marks the like of which [Gdila](http://the-king-of-novices.tumblr.com/post/104486350666/live-forever-or-die-trying-the-pantheon-2-10) was cursed to bear on his body for the rest of his life—the long, winding body of a scarlet dragon in the form of Sheker’s own, permanently inked into [Gdila](http://the-king-of-novices.tumblr.com/post/104486350666/live-forever-or-die-trying-the-pantheon-2-10)’s skin, as if it slithered down his throat expanding in a spiraling descend across his torso, until, at last, and leaving only the tail wound round his neck, its head comes to rest near his groin, alongside his hipbone.

 

* * *

 

Altaïr lies in bed tracing down the valley between his hipbone and lower belly. Beneath the chafed tips of his fingers runs the puckered ridge of a long scar, a present relic of a past wound. His right arm rests asprawl, aside, as if away and disconnected from his body, far in the territory of Malik’s side of the bed. The warrior has long woken but the noble sleeps on his side with Altaïr’s hand under his own unconscious siege.

It’s a surprising but pleasant turn of events Malik is not even aware of. Altaïr had contemplated pulling the hand to himself to spare Malik the humiliation, but this far he has merely managed to recline on back loaning his hand to him and absentmindedly trace the most prominent of scars that litter his torso. If he pretends to be asleep upon Malik’s waking, perhaps then the humiliation could be avoided and their relations undamaged by Malik’s pride.

Before this thought can take proper halt in Altaïr’s mind he turns his head sideways in response to Malik’s stirring, to catch the first glimpse of him awake.

His face looks normal. His silence does not. And silence it is what Malik offers him as sample of his thoughts. Altaïr wishes he could judge his mood through manner of speech but Malik is not inclined to talk today. The edge of Malik’s mouth curves up into a frown and his brows curve down into a scowl and his eyes are displeased with what he sees, and he sees his own hands holding Altaïr’s (not the other way around as it's supposed to be) and this clasp of hands drawn close to his own body (not Altaïr’s).

Malik isn’t giving him the rough side of his tongue this morning, but the manner in which he unwinds his hold and pushes Altaïr’s hand away make him wonder whether words would have been less harsh. He removes his hand from Malik’s vicinity (he hasn’t even had chance to part with a kiss), he admits to himself that he has no control over this marriage. The greater their closeness is, the hazier its edges grow, as if its outlines are melting, and now it’s dissolved altogether. And the fault is Malik’s alone.

He gives quickly and regrets quicker.

“I need fresh clothes,” Altaïr asks when he’s sitting up and watching Malik move about the bedroom. He doesn’t expect much, he isn’t sure what he expects, but it’s not Malik producing a clean pair of breeches and a tunic, even less having the tunic put on by him. He allows Malik to dress him in silence lest he disrupts this show of domesticity.

“Why are you so obedient today?“

“I don’t want to hear your voice.“

Malik finishes dressing him in a way thoughtfully distant, and Altaïr chooses to speak, after a stunned pause, because he can’t trust himself to remain silent while another hole is being drilled into his hopes.

“What have I done to earn such contempt for my voice?”

“It’s less a matter of what you’ve _done_ and more a matter of who you _are_.”

“I thought we moved past this.”

“Old wounds still linger.”

Altaïr wishes to find common grounds, far from the sight of all disagreements, but agreement requires two willing parties and presently he seems to be the only willing one. His thoughts zigzag for a few moments and Malik removes himself from his sight before he can find the right course—he shouldn’t speak, probably, to avoid rousing Malik’s temper, but there is more he wants to say. His determination clambers up on spindly, primitive legs, and these legs are made from poor bricks of necessity. He will be out of home today, for a time, and Malik must know why.

“I intend to visit the temple, for worship. After dinner if I am able.”

He turns to see if Malik has registered his words, and finds him sitting in front of [Nokem](http://the-king-of-novices.tumblr.com/post/104486337526/live-forever-or-die-trying-the-pantheon-1-10). He hasn’t started prayer yet. Altaïr is sure that Malik heard him and not so sure about receiving a response, so he picks himself up to make his way out of bedroom when Malik’s voice reaches him, and it’s not intended for him (it often isn’t, since it’s intended for a man Malik believes him to be and he isn't).

“Forgive me, father,” he murmurs to the statue of [Nokem](http://the-king-of-novices.tumblr.com/post/104486337526/live-forever-or-die-trying-the-pantheon-1-10), then picks up from the statue’s pedestal a palette of feathers, colorful, and of various origins. It seems a private collection, a small treasure shared between Malik and his patron. And it’s not the feathers that make Altaïr keenly interested (he’s seen them before while first exploring the bedroom) it’s Malik fanning the feathers out and thrusting them before Altaïr in silent offering.

In retrospect, Altaïr has never received a more honorable gift. [Gdila](http://the-king-of-novices.tumblr.com/post/104486350666/live-forever-or-die-trying-the-pantheon-2-10) is a lover of feathers and presenting gaudy feathers to the god as libation is a common custom among worshipers of [Gdila](http://the-king-of-novices.tumblr.com/post/104486350666/live-forever-or-die-trying-the-pantheon-2-10)—a beloved but curious practice, since most of his pretty feathers [Gdila](http://the-king-of-novices.tumblr.com/post/104486350666/live-forever-or-die-trying-the-pantheon-2-10) gifts to his lover [Nokem](http://the-king-of-novices.tumblr.com/post/104486337526/live-forever-or-die-trying-the-pantheon-1-10) as ornament for his turban. And yet no human offers feathers to [Nokem](http://the-king-of-novices.tumblr.com/post/104486337526/live-forever-or-die-trying-the-pantheon-1-10) since they seem to be better-received coming from [Gdila](http://the-king-of-novices.tumblr.com/post/104486350666/live-forever-or-die-trying-the-pantheon-2-10)’s hand.

In presenting his collection, Malik is offering a feather of Altaïr’s choice to present to [Gdila](http://the-king-of-novices.tumblr.com/post/104486350666/live-forever-or-die-trying-the-pantheon-2-10) as libation. His choice is lavish—a menagerie of colors and diversity in size—but he’s not wont to disrupt this pretty collection by taking feathers that might carry greater meaning to Malik.

“You collect feathers?” He asks the apparent to ease the harshness of silence between them.

“Yes.”

Malik is giving from his own collection to enhance his prayer and Altaïr would like to deny him this sacrifice, but it is something Malik has offered on his own volition. And Altaïr aims to show that he will accept whatever Malik gives through free will, that whatever affection or gift is offered on his own will be appreciated without return. The gesture patches him up again, sews the rift that cracked his chest only moments before; Malik is generous in giving as he is in taking away.

Altaïr’s choice is modest, a whitish feather of moderate size, flecked by stripes of dirt-brown around the middle.

He takes the feather and kisses the hand that gives them to him.

 

* * *

 

By the time Malik leaves home at last he has a tale to tell. Of how he’d squandered the entire morning, noon, and a chunk of afternoon juggling between several jobs. He is doing two men’s work, but Leonardo is doing the work of at least four men which humbles him by far, so he noiselessly makes his way through the din of community with the bulk of a fresh delivery of clothes suspended in the crook of his arm.

There’s three peers at the well, all women, who left his spot unoccupied as is common custom among those who wash frequently and remember each other’s usual washing basins by heart.

His mind is on his habitual washing routine (to avoid being elsewhere) when an ominous giggle passes over the group on the water-well, and Malik is surer than ever that they are in the midst of what Malik just barged in, also eloquently known as ‘sex talk’. A talk which includes blatant boasting the lengths of their husbands’ cocks (that seem to grow in size with every new reunion on the well), bragging about their husbands’ sexual prowess, and occasionally lauding the bed skills of those they would taste, given chance—a part which regrettably included Ezio Auditore the last time Malik had been unfortunate enough to wash clothes during sex talk.

Malik is wont to think that the subject of husbands, while not unfitting for his female company, had been unfitting for him, which accounted for the fatal split between him and his peers when it came to knowledge of and interest in sex. He excluded himself willingly from something he hadn’t expected as a widower. Talk doesn’t perplex him, he had been aloof enough to not allow people to tickle his interest because loyalty demanded his constant attention, and Malik’s loyalty seems to cement itself firmly after the passing of those to whom it has been pledged. Without a husband, talk of sex had been useless prattle. With Altaïr, the prattle hasn’t changed to talk.

“There’s hardly anything better than enjoying your husband’s cock,“ says the temperamental girl to his right.

Addressing this proposition would be an insult to Malik’s acumen, but he remembers roaring with laughter once, and now he’s silent. Whatever’s changed in the meantime is less relevant than how his silence will be accepted—and it’s not.

“We share opinions, don’t we?“

Malik has registered her approaching proximity as she started to lean in, has anticipated the knock of her shoulder against his own, has recognized that her conspiratorial smile is meant for him. He doesn’t challenge her persuasiveness, he has no arguments for or against, he feels cheated of involvement in this conversation.

He is quiet.

And somewhere between dousing a few pieces of soaked clothes in soap and lunging for other clothes from his pail, it occurs to Malik that his company are implying the inapplicable, which is that he, Malik—a widower until recently and almost-murderer soon thereafter—is sleeping with his husband and would therefore find himself stocked with arguments _for_ this proposition. And it’s not the implication that makes him halt and freeze (a serious implication expects at least a serious allusion, and Malik has given hint to no such thing), it’s the realization that these girls, perhaps others in the community, _probably_ others, believe that he has (willingly) lost his virginity to the warrior.

And if this hasn’t already stalled all his movements, then Altaïr does.

He enters the courtyard from the boil-room, with a fat tree log in arm and maul for splitting firewood in the other, naked to the waist and cruelly abusing Malik’s self-discipline which is generally under-trained in this matter.

Malik instinctively knows it’s a sight that will feed his imagination for weeks on end.

That Altaïr prances around half-naked is not an image reserved only for himself as everyone is exposed to it, but it seems to Malik that only he responds so violently to it. There’s enough firewood, Mary has seen to it yesterday; he doesn’t understand why Altaïr has chosen _now_ to make himself useful. And yet he stands there with his back to the water-well, next to the chopping block set between the garden plot and the tunnel-entrance where the hanging drapery is confused between ballooning and retreating along the cobblestones like a trailing scarlet skirt after every wayward gust of wind.

The first bark of the maul yelps across the courtyard promptly reminding Malik to look away, aside, down, _anywhere_ , but even with averted gaze he knows that across them Altaïr is half-naked and sweaty with exertion and Malik’s thoughts inevitably, regrettably, take the familiar path to Altaïr’s body.

He could look away, it’s only a question of persisting.

Contrary to the community’s belief, Malik is going nowhere near his husband’s cock, and he flatly refuses in spite of all inner admonishments and even pleadings to acknowledge that his husband’s cock is impressive, even without Malik’s proper sampling. It’s acknowledgement he must keep from himself more so than from others, because acknowledging Altaïr’s body would equal allowing himself to enjoy it, and though Malik’s gaze is wide, his conscience is not.

His morals are not as generous as to admit defeat in the face of _a body_ ; yet his body is more liberal in its views, and as he furtively glances up from his washing basin he sees a thickset man sculpted to perfection, he sees how his muscles are swelling with effort and dampened with sweat, glistening, and this one furtive gaze on Altaïr’s body strays him to quick lust.

Is it because he’s never really had a husband before?

Malik has never confused solitude for craving. Now he’s not sure if he’s confusing craving Altaïr (his body and not the man, never the man) with general, unspecific craving befitting his age. Against the odds, he hopes for the latter and awaits the former, since his body has never been so set aflame and stubbornly disobedient at the sight of someone’s body.

He steals another furtive glance while his gloved hands work from memory, sans any visual supervision, and then he feels himself stare. The leery face of lust grins down at him, openly jeering. His body persists in explaining why he should give in, his mind persists in arguing, bullying, coaxing, going down on its knees and imploring his body to not give in, until he’s at war with himself and half-frantic between greed and fear. Something so ordinary as a man’s body shouldn’t drive his mind to groans of agony, nor prayers for strength.

He has thought that he once paid his debt to this marriage through loyalty but he’s paying over and over by suffering need to touch a man he doesn’t want to incorporate into his life.

He could have him.

He could.

It’s within his capacity to take what he wants from Altaïr. He’s small and bullied into a tiny corner by the possibility that Altaïr wants to be touched; worse, that _he_ wants to be touched, and _worst_ —that the only barrier is he himself.

Malik can’t help but feel that something is wrong, that awareness is steadily cutting itself through his lust-hazed skull, he can't help but notice that it appears his cock has stiffened (again) and that his swelling shaft is calling his attention because its place is not anymore in the confines of his clothes.

His gaze doesn’t drop into his lap to have a look, he sits nestled inside the curvature of his washing basin and he can shade his lap with arms, but he can almost see it rise slowly, like bread. There’s not a dram of coordination in the movement of his hands as they wade through soaped water, but he begins to move slower until he’s not moving at all, until he’s gorged himself on Altaïr’s (magnificent, sweaty, powerful) body to the bursting point again, until his erection is straining against breeches.

He doesn’t move until he’s drained his stock of self-discipline, and then at last, more from exhaustion than anything else, he gives in quite suddenly. He hands over his washing to the water leaving it to soak in his absence, he conceals to the best of his ability the front of his groin where his tunic is visibly tenting.

He makes off.

Up the stairs and right into Leonardo’s shop, almost colliding with Salai.

A mishmash of more than a few feelings lead him rushing to Leonardo, most prominent among them panic.

“Leonardo!” He hollers, more yelp than a cry for attention, before he finds the man cutting through a piece of leather, and he may or may not be working on Altaïr’s clothes when Malik barges in establishing himself on a small stool in front of him, and without framing his words carefully proclaims:

“I’ve an erection.”

Leonardo’s visage, which up to this point has been a paragon of worry, renovates itself until it’s completely and entirely—blank.

“I’m at a loss of words.”

“No, no, you don’t understand,” Malik slants forward soldering fingers into fists atop Leonardo’s knees to sharpen his words, he looks as if he’s just woken up from a fever, he’s shivering, “It’s the result of watching my husband.”

Leonardo bobs a quick nod, then a slower one, until it melts into a mildly confused, “Alright?”

“It’s _far_ from alright,” Malik starts frantically, “I shouldn’t have allowed it. I shouldn’t have allowed myself to _look_ at him, or to be swayed by his looks or body—!“

“Malik,” Leonardo cuts in, knocking the pair of cramping fists on his lap together into his hold to silence him in word and movement both, “If you could see how absurd you look, you would stop with it.”

Malik’s shoulders slump making them sag inwards even more but, partly enveloped by this muffler, he listens. Leonardo has, by virtue of experience and his own knack for pacifism, long grown cunning in dealing with Malik’s temper. He knows that in Malik’s case, two fires don’t blend into one bigger fire. Instead, one well-lit fire can extinguish and replace Malik’s own. Leonardo exploits this knowledge whenever Malik bursts into a blaze, and the fire he’s currently fighting is mediocre and reluctant and easy to subdue. He allows time for the words to find Malik and resonate with him, watches him until it seems he’s returned to sobriety.

“So you find him attractive?” He asks when the fists in his lap turn loose.

“I don’t like that I do.”

“Better that you do than that you don’t.” There’s justice in his argument, and Malik needs a moment to steel himself to accept it, ”He loves you, you know.”

“He doesn’t. He loves nobody and nobody loves him.”

“I don’t think he is fully aware, but he does love you,” Leonardo explains spinning the tips of his thumbs around the knobs of Malik’s knuckles. The touch reminds Malik of Altaïr. It’s starkly different from his husband’s. Where Leonardo’s is paternal affection, Altaïr’s is unreserved reverence.

“How can he love me when he’s known me for such a short time?”

“Ezio told me that in all this time he’s never taken a lover.”

Altaïr had implied as much before he fucked his thighs raw on their first night together, but Malik refrains from mentioning this minor detail. Malik does not want to refer to this confirmation of fidelity, it pains him to know how well he had reacted to this unexpected knowledge, it unnerves him that it matters to him whether Altaïr lent his body to others during their marriage.

“I hate him.” There is a deep furrow between his eyebrows, and another down between his nose and tightly shut lips.

“Why? Because you’re looking for reasons to hate him? Because you’ve fallen into the habit of it?”

The furrows flatten; the fire simmers down to dampened coals. It’s no use fighting Leonardo with poorly-founded arguments, it’s no use fighting him at all. Altaïr has demonstrated tremendous growth in a stunningly short amount of time. He begrudgingly admits it (he will always stumble to admit whatever makes Altaïr more human) but Altaïr has learned to respect boundaries, to appreciate his cooking, to value his past and present efforts, to worm himself inside his chest. It’s uncanny, how he’s calmer about accepting these facts in the presence of Leonardo. Uncannier still how he feels ready to break a completely different, completely untouched subject.

“I don’t see what _he_ sees in me. Not because I’m not worthy, but because I see nothing a man like him would see worth of noting in me. I excel at sword, but I’m not as strong as he is. My body is not forged to challenge his.” There is a ripple on his cheeks as he tightens his own jaw with a gnashing of teeth in response to his own confession. It would take him years, more, to shape his body into a powerful machine that is Altaïr. He has nothing, or hardly anything, to match it.

Leonardo laughs and there’s genuine amusement in his voice, and fun, and a hint of disapprobation, but Malik knows it’s well-intended even as he tilts his gaze up from Leonardo’s lap to peer at him intently with a creased brow.

“Oh, foolish boy…” Leonardo says parting one hand from their join of hands to tug at the soft of Malik’s ear in manner he’s picked up from Mary, “These men, these warriors, do not lust for copies of themselves. They have spent years by each other’s side, their tastes move towards things more delicate. A stability and peace, a soft partner to cherish, someone to nurse away the visions of their past.”

“So he wants me for _being_ different…?” Malik trails off, bizarrely captivated by this unexplored possibility. He receives his confirmation through Leonardo’s expression, through a smile half unwrapped to allow Malik to reach conclusions through self-effort.

“I hate him,” Malik murmurs stubbornly to alleviate the gravity of his ensuing confession, “but his body is most pleasing to the eye, as if forged by marble and granite... and I don’t come close to that in body.”

“ _Your_ beauty is made of different metal. One, I believe, Altaïr admires more than marble. Yours is shaped by a different sort of work, by slender muscle molded into more elegant forms, smaller and slimmer perhaps, but charming in comparison to the bulk of their bodies—ones that have been forged for war,” Leonardo explains and follows the swirl of emotions on Malik’s face. His scowl has a chip in it before it crumbles entirely and his expression turns sharply—it’s alive with interest and rediscovered self-worth. He surprises Malik’s ear with another soft tug to draw attention, “He wants to find you soft and pleasing. Not hard and challenging.”

Malik averts his face in a way that has nothing to do with Leonardo’s touch on his ear. His expressions run a full circle before they’re at the scowl he had started with.

“He gave me grievance, I won’t reward him with swift apology and servitude,” Malik mutters tartly and Leonardo has the impression that at least a part of his bitterness might have been directed at himself for proposing forgiveness.

“I’m not implying that you should. I was merely pointing out that desires shouldn’t shame you. You are a young virile man with a handsome husband. Enjoying offered view and indulging in self-pleasure is only natural,” Leonardo winds up with a concluding tone, though he feels he should append another observation, “You could have him, though. Not that I urge you to some particular course of action.”

“Nor will I take the course that you do _not_ urge...”

Leonardo rewards Malik’s sarcastic quip with another tug on his ear, which is more pull than tug this time, but he allows Malik’s word to be the last. Small though it is, his suggestion will leave lasting impact on the noble. It is difficult arguing with him while he balances on a scale of indecision. It is difficult arguing with him at all times.

Malik believes a great part of his own lies.

 

* * *

 

Long after Altaïr has split all log pieces into firewood and wandered away to the very center of the city for prayer, Malik lies on bed, yet to accept Altaïr as firewood for his own fantasies.

He lies, half-sprawled across Altaïr’s side of bed with a hand half-way up his nightclothes, and his mind is a chaotic blank.

White, like the ceiling he is staring up at. White like the feather Altaïr had chosen from his collection. White like the very center in the gleam of his lamplight reflects on the mosquito hook above—a dot of white inside a pang of yellow immured by the silver of the steel around.

White as the sheets he lies on and not nearly as pristine. White, like Altaïr’s semen on his inner thigh on this very side of bed, days ago.

Blank.

He had wanted to go to a secluded corner and there make a quiet mental meal of it all, but self-confessions would come and go in his mind, they could even wander around his body and limbs, but they aren’t intimately and securely connected with Malik’s heart and he’s reluctant to let them beyond this final bastille—beyond it are no defenses.

Malik racks his brain again and inside are thoughts of a body he stares at brainlessly but never feels comfortable enough to imagine in the silence of his head. There’s a stream of fantasies which he longs so to start, but they’re enshrouded in white mist; like the ceiling he’s contemplating. Could he leave Altaïr altogether and indulge in self-pleasure all the same? But it would be a usual routine with a blind spot. An unfinished picture—uncolored with thoughts of husband.

He wants to know more. He wants to know all. Otherwise he will remain as incomplete as his comfort in accepting Altaïr as fantasy. Leonardo has assured him in the righteousness of this. The only thing he needs to learn is how far he is comfortable to go. How to start upon his quest.

He pulls the nightclothes up to his groin, barely above his half-hard cock. He applies some pressure and tightens his fist around his cock—it’s still plenty oiled up—he winds round the image of Altaïr to introduce his body to something milder as introduction, something he’s grown familiar with.

His body had responded to sexual impulse before, pale and rudimentary as it had been, and in the scarcity of material to indulge in (for he had been a young, loyal widower for a time), Malik had and still does turn to a fantasy well-known: he imagines himself to be [Nokem](http://the-king-of-novices.tumblr.com/post/104486337526/live-forever-or-die-trying-the-pantheon-1-10) making love to [Gdila](http://the-king-of-novices.tumblr.com/post/104486350666/live-forever-or-die-trying-the-pantheon-2-10).

He suffers a couple of false starts. His mind is wandering off, thrilled by the possibility of introducing Altaïr to what is an old fantasy worn thin from overuse. His former urges pale in comparison with his current ones and familiar images that have been satisfactory in quenching his thirst before now seem bleak, even as he imagines [Gdila ](http://the-king-of-novices.tumblr.com/post/104486350666/live-forever-or-die-trying-the-pantheon-2-10)tearing [Nokem](http://the-king-of-novices.tumblr.com/post/104486337526/live-forever-or-die-trying-the-pantheon-1-10)’s turban off and fisting his hair, keeping his head up and the curve of his back in a tight bend and stuffing him full of cock while his wings arch around them, spread and tipped downwards as if to envelop the bed. Malik feeds this familiar image with leftovers, until it’s dying and the pressure on his shaft is weak, reluctant. The leaden sluggishness of this daydream is not even an introduction to more, it’s endeavor. Hopeless gropings among dissolving things.

He stops, and he’s hungry for something else.

Faces swap place and where [Gdila](http://the-king-of-novices.tumblr.com/post/104486350666/live-forever-or-die-trying-the-pantheon-2-10)’s has been Altaïr’s hovers above him, wings swap place with ropes, and what remains in Malik’s head is Altaïr with arms tied up, helpless while Malik takes from him. It’s odd, how he’s content with being taken when in form of [Nokem](http://the-king-of-novices.tumblr.com/post/104486337526/live-forever-or-die-trying-the-pantheon-1-10) and taking from Altaïr in different context. Odd, because the ensuing sting of  pleasure is so violent, so rebellious that the assault captures his entire body and has nowhere to hide. Through throes of arousal Malik returns to his cock with a firm clutch and firmer stroking. It’s perplexing; how readily his body has jumped to wanton indulgence as soon as Altaïr’s form has replaced a god, how tightly his chest constricts with the image of himself riding Altaïr on all fours, how abruptly it has thrust him to the very brink of precipice. To know with what swiftness the thought of Altaïr on his knees with arms tied up and having his cock served could make him climax is humiliating.

It’s in this bewildered state of mind and body that Malik is compelled to put brakes on himself, drawing hands up across confused folds of tunic to deprive his cock of touch, stealing time before he could end what hasn’t even properly started.

His body has reacted more violently to Altaïr than he had anticipated.

Importing him into fantasy feels a mistake, one he couldn’t even finish for fear of wanting him there at all times from now on, his failure is absurd, horrible, excruciating. Excruciating, because—once introduced to the effects of one man on his fantasy—his body wants more, it’s voracious with new appetites, it’s vulgar and seizing the rest of him while his mind is weak.

It’s as frightful as it is exciting.

He has just enough means to swap Altaïr’s name with Gdila’s, for he can’t allow a moan of Altaïr’s name to pass his lips. That’s all he can control, the rest of him is a lust’s slave. The want for repeated image of his husband is slowly ripping his mind to shreds and dismantling the bastille around his heart brick by brick until it lets Altaïr in again. Resisting amounts to agony.

Malik had taken the precaution to measure how much time Altaïr should be absent on his visit to the temple (Malik requires peace to indulge in self-pleasure), but he’s done nothing to anticipate this reaction. And his body is hungry, and ravenous, _starving_ , and in the end—it consumes his mind while resistance seeps away.

 

* * *

 

It’s not Gdila’s name that gives rise to suspicion when Altaïr returns home, it’s the moan that has distorted the word which makes Altaïr realize with a pang that inside he might find Malik hurt. Either hurt or in an even more delicate situation as the moans seem to be walking the hazy line between pain or pleasure.

He spans the gap between the door and the bedroom passage in an instance, noiselessly, hoping to find him uninjured and not daring to hope to find him as he does.

Malik doesn’t raise his head to meet the passage between bedroom and first room, busy as he is, he doesn’t check for nosy intruders (if he has been checking to begin with), he must be certain sure that Altaïr is still at the temple. It’s by a chance conjuncture of circumstances that Altaïr has found him thus.

He avoids the unnecessary venture of exposing himself but even this peering from behind a wall leads him to obtain an unexpected glimpse into his husband’s privacy. Their quilt is spun into a roll, leaving him on bare sheets. The low-and-quivering lamplight is setting the film of sweat on Malik’s body aflame. The stiff body and slackened jaw and moist lips quickly drying with soft wisps of air. His disheveled black hair is meshing with white bed-linen, head thrown back and sunk in Altaïr’s pillow and his stroking untamed, the touch of his other hand a disorganized effort jumping from chest to thighs, then sheets below.

This collection of a few minor details makes an unforgettable image—a ravishing sight, one Altaïr has chance to witness solely through a spontaneous decision to find the first street niche that houses Gdila’s statue instead of walking all the way to the temple at such late hour. Malik hasn’t anticipated his early arrival. He is too racked by whatever is giving him such pleasure to sense the intruder, he doesn’t touch anything beyond his cock and yet he’s at the precipice, he’s slanting over it and about to fall.

It’s sin interrupting someone so obscenely aroused.

Altaïr possesses a military discipline that is the same in all warriors, discipline that is always there, except in Malik’s presence. It would be unfair to claim that Altaïr has made no effort to control impulse. He doesn’t make none, he makes some effort, and he struggles. He had spoken out of turn before, frequently in Malik’s presence, but what he’s about to do is a piece of rudeness he allows himself, or a treat he’s chosen to reward himself with.

“Gdila won’t give you what you seek,” he says with sham casualness.

When Malik starts up, raising his gaze at last, Altaïr is standing unconcealed, as is the state of his cock—engorged and bulging through the front of his breeches. Perhaps he ought to have taken another path, sliding in, ingratiating himself, and postponing such a sudden barging in until a more favorable moment; but somehow he’s hoped that the matter might be settled on the spot. Except he now has the uneasy feeling he has committed a terrible blunder.

Malik has entirely iced over; he freezes like one of those confounded people whose body locks up and resists movement when humiliated. He tries, he does. He makes effort to yank his nightclothes down while hoisting himself up and it’s a move completely vain as it misses its mark and the tunic shirrs between his erection and belly leaving him exposed—he squares his shoulders up and slips again in his attempt, he throws up one hand in an abrupt convulsion, regains his balance only slightly, enough to stoop to pick up the hem of his nightclothes again and cover himself, and it seems madly absurd for someone who has only moments before lounged relaxed on bed with parted lips and wet breath and a messy, compulsive stroking to be startled into fear in the very next instance.

His hands are fisted in folds of his tunic pressing them to his thighs (as if Altaïr will leap at him to wrestle it away) to ease the tremble, and he’s moving his lips in soundless comment, perplexed, then lifting his eyebrows and forgetting them there, left high upon his dampened forehead where they remain long after all trace of initial shock has gone. Doubt remains, and shame; fear sits ugly on his face, knitted into the deep-and-warm flush suffusing Malik’s cheeks and jaw and neck.

A little recovered after the shock of such a bitter reception, Altaïr puts his hands up in a gesture of surrender. His hunch though, is that Malik is not afraid of him, but afraid of having his intimacy compromised, of having to give up to Altaïr more than he’s been comfortable with, and now that his bubble has burst he must suffer the consequence of adaptation.

Altaïr has the feeling that he’s lost, that he has nowhere to go except forward.

He proceeds very carefully.

With one hand still held up for Malik’s watch and inspection, he plucks up the nearest stool to station himself on, near the passageway, away from Malik—to bribe him with safety.

“I won’t touch you,” he assures assuming a tone Ezio had proposed to him, seeing how Malik is pulling at the hem of his tunic to envelop the knee once he’s curled one leg under him, “Go on, please… I only want to watch you. You look—“

 _Breathtaking_ visits his mind first. _Handsome_ next, and then _you’re making my cock rise_ —all of which are pitiable and inadequate in bringing his sentiment across, and so he says nothing and watches confusion addle Malik’s poor head. Malik moves his lips and lower jaw mutely once or twice, wants to say something, does not, and goes on with his mute distress. But it’s not rejection; thus far, luck is with Altaïr.

Altaïr’s entire enterprise does nibble on Malik’s patience, but he seems plenty patient to Altaïr. Perhaps fear is molding him into something more patient though Altaïr would trade fear for impatience anytime. Fear is not what he’s seeking to evoke in Malik.

This fear lives for a certain stretch of time and his shoulders lose their tension then, but his erection is wilting along. It must be self-consciousness. He is uncomfortable enough for having been caught doing what Altaïr has longed for since a very long, long time, and his difficulty to return to his previous state of arousal is little surprise.

To ease Malik he must put himself at the same level without threatening his autonomy.

He shifts on his chair, more for lack of movement than out of nervousness, and, wearing a smile, he quickly doffs his tunic leaving himself bare-chested before Malik. He unties his breeches. He pulls out his cock and his sack next. It must make quite a sight, standing upright as it is; it’s plausible, seeing how Malik can hardly manage to part gaze from where the weight of his balls has flattened down the flaps of his breeches, or how his eyes proceeded to follow with incredible rapidity and very beautifully the path of Altaïr’s hands. In short, Altaïr starts feeling himself up facing Malik. He watches Malik, and Malik watches his body with rapt attention.

The warrior doesn’t mind; a few touches, a curious look, and a little deft questioning might all at once settle him down and rinse the fear from his head.

He makes an unnecessary visit to his abdomen which seems to have captured Malik’s attention on more than one occasion, to drag his spread palm down the center of his chest, lower, skimming through the narrow valley between the muscles of his abdomen with the tip of his thumb and then finally slinking down the cut of muscle on hipbone which tapers into his groin. He’s never done the business of self-pleasure this way but it matters little—he doesn’t aspire for his own comfort but to lead Malik’s attention astray. With a sweep of his thumb he smooths down the leathery skin of his sack before resting the weight in his palm.

“Do you like having them touched?” he asks, so as to set the ball rolling.

Malik catches a glimpse of his face at last—a shy, rushed peek before dropping his gaze to where Altaïr is rolling his balls in the cup of his hand—and then twitches a cursory shrug. That shrug, quick as it is, reminds Altaïr of who exactly is sitting on the bed before him. The youth folded up and half-straddling the mattress contains not a jot of his feisty, outrageously rebellious former self. It appears that somewhere between effort to accept him as a human and endeavor to accept him as a husband, Malik has found himself at a stage of perpetual confusion. All Altaïr sees now is a young mind tripping over his inexperience, tripping up steps so unfamiliar to him. If he’s never been touched, as he claims he hasn’t, then he wouldn’t know how having his body touched feels.

“Have you ever tried to touch yourself like this?“ Altaïr corrects himself.

He seals his fingers round the upper half of his shaft, keeping his thumb just below ridge of the meaty head. Malik probably can’t close his fist around Altaïr’s cock without applying pressure liberally, but Altaïr can, barely—it’s that thick and full. Though his strokes are languid, lazy in comparison to what his cock is used to, the rest of his curled fist is holding his shaft almost passively while the side of his thumb is applying all the real pressure with learned accuracy. He fears Malik can’t at this angle quite see what he’s trying to demonstrate so he bends his cock somewhat tipping it forward to show how he’s pumping his fist up near the tip.

Malik shakes his head barely shaking it at all—it’s his only response to Altaïr’s question—and what has once been an impregnable fortress of disinterest disintegrates into keen curiosity for what Altaïr is doing, and he inspects offered display with a loose-lipped, unkempt stare.

“Try it,” Altaïr instructs while granting himself a couple more pumps, for demonstration’s sake; there’s friction but not enough to get him going, and nowhere powerful enough as the image of Malik touching himself.

“Why?” Malik voices his first real word since Altaïr’s return. It’s breathy, it’s trying (and failing) to hide whetted interest.

“Never mind that,” Altaïr says to say something, “The question is how, not why.”

“Every how has its why.”

“To make you feel good. To finish what you’ve started,” Altaïr retorts despite the quip.

Across, on the bed, Malik wrestles with himself for some time disentangling the three or four precautionary thoughts that have happened to remain in his head for some time, and then, with non-deliberate slowness, he gathers the hem of his tunic to lift it off his sex. As Altaïr had suspected, he’s wilted from his former fullness but he’s aroused enough to sample what Altaïr suggests. On some level, Altaïr has feared that he’s, perhaps, forcing premature bloom, but he can already make out the hum of eager breathing mere moments after Malik has begun to emulate what Altaïr is doing. He’s there; he might not be an apple ready for the plucking, but he’s a bud ready to bloom, hopefully under his guidance and supervision.

“And this?” he asks noting how Malik has slowed down reluctantly, “Have you tried this?”

Altaïr lifts a hand bringing it to his lips to wet a gap between two of his fingers, the sides of them. He releases hold on his shaft and it cocks back towards his belly and, curling his fingers towards his palm, he scissors a gap between his curled-and-wet index and middle fingers enveloping only the crown of his cock into this tight gap before pulling up. It’s a move considerably more racy than his last one, taking into account the friction around the sensitive ridge of the glans (the response to which Malik can clearly see in the way the muscles in Altaïr’s lower belly have jumped from the sensation), but as long as Malik doesn’t apply a vice pressure, and Altaïr is positive that he won’t, it can’t go (completely) wrong.

“Hold onto the head like so,“ he demonstrates again on his own cock to cajole Malik into a try, to ease and flatten his tension and get is mind back on track, and Malik is quickly persuaded but also quick to fail.

Altaïr isn’t satisfied with the execution and it must show on his face because Malik stops short before repeat, his hand hovering above the head of his cock. Then he sets his hand to mattress and his gaze drops to shun Altaïr’s own—Altaïr is afraid he’ll wilt again and his disinterest will bloom instead. And he doesn't want Malik’s inexperience to drive a wedge between them now.

Altaïr has thought that tonight he will merely guide Malik, but seeing how a few convincing suggestions suffice to shatter his resistance, different kinds of guidance start to worm itself into his head. He has thought that his visit to Malik’s privacy would be very short, very innocent, but once he’s tasted success his appetite has grown exponentially.

He’s ready to fully neglect himself all night (a thought which had been inconceivable upon his very arrival here), so passionate is his longing to touch his husband—just to see and to watch the shadows of pleasure flit across his face again. But he couldn’t blackmail himself into Malik’s proximity. That is out of the question. So he tries something different, even as he’s sure that this, too, is a shade too enterprising.

“I could show you…”

He has one chance in a thousand of winning tonight. And yet this braces him; he wants his choice restricted to how far he can go and what he’s forbidden to cross. If necessary, he’s ready to shamble out of bedroom in the case of Malik’s refusal.

Malik wavers for far less than Altaïr expects him to.

He nods, and the moment is so quick and fleeting that Altaïr has a nostalgic urge to re-enter it and see the nod again.

It surprises that Malik let the suggestion pass without a qualm. Altaïr doesn’t dwell on what exactly in his tone or staging or act foxed him into it, but fate has amply rewarded him for his decision and he rejoices in the success he’s purchased through risk.

He lifts himself from the stool leaving his tunic behind, and though he does feel outlandish with his cock sticking out like that, he leaves his breeches not only unfastened—he sheds them entirely by the time he’s by the bedside.

He feels an odd little shiver of elation of a cheerful adventurer when Malik doesn’t tell him to put his clothes back on, and a shiver of arousal when Malik fixes himself upright to make space for Altaïr. There’s a curious little vessel deposited on the bed-table and it catches his eye because it’s not an lamp oil—Altaïr’s best guess is that Malik left body oil handy to replenish. He dips two-three fingers inside (he can’t fit in more) and rubs his palms prior to easing himself behind Malik. He then sits back on his haunches, knees astride, and pulls Malik into the gap between his thighs for a tighter fitting. He hooks his fingers into his nightclothes to divest him of the tunic and there Malik deceives him into dread as he locks his hands down keeping them in place on his own thighs.

“It’s easier without it,” he whispers, for fear of letting his voice be known fully lest Malik is reminded who he is.

The pressure on his hands is first halved and then released and he proceeds in doffing the tunic with a reason and an excuse given—the reason being that attuning himself to Malik’s experience will help him focus on Malik’s pleasure, and the excuse being that the sheer heat he’s known to radiate off himself will be enough to replace the tunic, and he’d gladly allow Malik to pilfer heat from him. And once he’s left in the nude Malik looks over his shoulder to catch a glimpse of Altaïr’s face when he suspects the warrior busy with folding his tunic and instead catches a glimpse of Altaïr’s radiant, black-lashed amber eyes. He looks this only time at him, and never again; he snaps his gaze ahead to never attempt the same, committed to avoiding Altaïr’s eyes altogether, as if he can’t bear to look at the face of the one who will give him pleasure.

Altaïr had hoped to solicit a kiss or two, but he doubts Malik will be looking over his shoulder anytime soon. Despite this, he is still a winner. In the end, his perseverance is rewarded and Malik shuffles further into his lap when Altaïr seizes him by the waist to pull him in. Though he longs to tilt and angle Malik’s neck and head to his personal liking, he has learned to stay his hand from his neck, having absorbed the lesson from their first night of reunion. Instead, he nudges his jaw aside with the tip of his nose and opens Malik’s neck for himself, for his mouth. A bluish vein on Malik’ neck seems to throb and Altaïr nuzzles into his neck feeling the pulse of Malik’s racing heart beneath the press of his lips, beneath the mesh of mouth and salty skin as he runs a kiss along a plummeting line down his neck until he’s not sure if it’s one kiss or many knitted together.

Malik will ruin him.

He wants his scent all over himself. He wants a handful of his seed and moans of his own name upon his lip.

Malik rolls down his shoulder exposing himself further and Altaïr scales a smacking path backwards, from the shoulder up to his jaw, breathing in the curious mix of musk, sweat, peaches, and sex, feeling Malik’s warmth on himself. His hands, oiled and splayed and hungry, start a slow descend down Malik’s sides and loop round his waist to meet just above his groin—Malik is arching into the pressure of his hands. It’s a reaction removed from conscience and owed solely to the will of Malik’s body; he has poor control over his libido. His curiosity is so impeccably pure. His innocence is neither over-embroidered nor untrue.

He’s innocent to the extent that he hasn’t been touched, and not innocent in aching to have his body touched.

To Malik, it’s not fantasy anymore. It’s not Gdila with Altaïr’s name and Altaïr with Gdila’s name, it’s not a god fanning his velvety wings but a man whose heat he feels on his back and waist, whose strength he feels on his own body. He has managed to keep his brain intact and alert, only until Altaïr has laid hand on him. Then he succumbs, starving for touch as he is.

Altaïr finds his cock unattended but lubed when he leans his chin upon Malik’s shoulder to glance down at it—all in order to demonstrate the reason of his coming here. From this viewpoint he can maneuver with ease. Malik’s cock is well-oiled and there’s little to no reason for doing what he is about to do, but he does it anyway.

He heads for the base first steadying his shaft with a pinch of one hand; with the other, with the very pad of a finger, he taps against a dewy bead of pre-come atop the crown dabbing the moisture across the swollen smoothness of his glans—he makes his circles perfectly round and perfectly closed—until dabbing strokes melt into a gentle rub around the sensitive ridge but more oozes out before he can distribute it evenly and it gathers on the summit of his head, glistening.

Malik is steadfast in his denial. Altaïr follows the twitch-and-jump of muscles in his belly but all he hears are gusts of breath that are soft lapses into almost-moans. Malik refuses, though, to part a genuine moan from his throat. Is mutual petting a term supposedly meaning (to Malik) having a contest in silence and playing denial on which egos are broken? Or is the only rival to his accepting this intimacy the very fear of acceptance? He wonders.

And while Altaïr’s insight into Malik’s inner troubles is completely obscured, his knowledge of the male body isn’t. He slinks from the top of his crown a little lower, down below the ridge where he envelops his crown between the knuckles of his index and middle finger pulling up as he’d done to himself—slower than that. The body bound in his arms tenses and Malik turns rigid in both body and voice. He’s on the threshold of giving in. Suddenly, with a hidden design leering behind the motion, Altaïr swings his other hand upwards dragging the pressure across Malik’s belly and chest until he’s locked his upper body completely beneath his arm and simultaneously covers the entire length of his cock with a few measured-long-twisting strokes.

What he earns instantaneously for this abrupt pleasurable assault is a thick, guttural moan.

Altaïr is aware that Malik has borne this assault without a murmur only moments before, and now when he’s heard his moan, Altaïr knows that his happiness is almost complete. It leaves on him the impression of delightful weightlessness, of standing several inches clear of the ground, as if towering over the youth in his arms instead of having him confined against his chest. There is pain-pleasure in the way Altaïr’s heart seems to rise to thud at the base of his throat. He’s thrilled by the stiff clutch of Malik’s hands on his own knees which are framing Malik’s (one of them even higher up Altaïr’s thigh and not so very far from his groin), and by the compliance of Malik’s body enfolded in his arms and the sound of his breathing rapidly through his nostrils (as if he’s trying to rectify the moan that has escaped him with renewed silence). This noble boy has a knack for turning a warrior’s brain into mushy slop with a single moan. A way of bringing him to a point of unfamiliar ecstasy, cold and sharp, just below the ribs.

Altaïr has a penchant for his moans and he wants many more to come. It’s beyond him to beg for something that’s not given freely, but it’s not beyond him to resort to trickery to obtain it. Or, in this case—handcraft.

His hand, splayed against the center of Malik’s chest, slinks down the same path it has scaled, down to his groin. Pre-come is leaving his cock in copious amounts even before Altaïr wraps a hand around the base. He’s expecting more.

“I felt your gaze linger as of late,” he whispers into Malik’s ear in a throaty, husk voice rousing him from pleasured stupor.

Altaïr sweeps his other hand back up Malik’s belly while he’s still coming to, to distract him from what pleasure he’s preparing for his cock. Malik’s mouth parts just as, instead of wrapping all his fingers evenly around the shaft of his cock, Altaïr pulls a ring of pressure up using only the thumb and index finger, the pressure of which melts into a prolonged-but-passing squeeze along the swollen crown of his cock. His timing is on point.

“Lies—” Malik breaks off, accentuating this untimely interruption with the most artless high-pitched moan. Malik’s body, propelled by the sudden stab of pleasure, launchs him into a thrust forward, right into Altaïr’s awaiting arm that quickly draws him back in towards his chest, and having pulled him more securely against his body, Altaïr presses a deep-set kiss into the join of his shoulder and neck with a breathy, drawn-out drone, even though he strives to make his own moans scarce to not put Malik off.

“It seems, then, I’ve jumped to false conclusions but landed on proper footings,” he whispers into moistened skin.

Maybe Malik can feel the stretch of his smile in the imprint of his lips on his shoulder. Altaïr had thought it wiser to bury his own lust, for Malik is renowned as a tyrant in their marriage and might refuse physical contact if he shows any hint of advance out of personal gain.

Altaïr rules his own body. He can put his body on a standstill, but putting a cork on his mouth is a lot harder.

“If you deny interest so hotly, I’m afraid my hand will fall unsure,” he breathes the words right into Malik’s ear feigning inexperience.

His touch comes to an abrupt halt.

Malik’s heart is thudding beneath the press of Altaïr’s hand, sweat glistening along his jaw. Altaïr’s index finger wavers just above the wet-and-swollen crown of his cock, unmoving, and Malik’s hips are stiff in trying to freeze a buck upwards into this tiny, simple touch of finger. Lust is devouring him from the inside; the more he tries to control it the more apparent it becomes how hard he’s trying to deny himself this touch. It’s only moments, few of them, before his reserve starts to disintegrate, and then:

“Excuses are tools of incompetence,” Malik stings at his mock-inexperience but the scorn is somewhat spoiled by a sultry breath that follows after.

It’s a green light, wrought with sarcasm as it is. Altaïr permits himself an inward sigh of relief.

“Bold words, coming from someone so inexperienced,” he teases in equal measure.

Putting the droll aside, Malik bucks vainly forward to let him know where he wants to be touched again. It would be nice to think that he knows how to touch himself in ways that Altaïr knows, but the fact is that he doesn’t. He has learned to indulge effectively, inelegantly, in furtive ways, and there are depths that are unexplored. His own touch is dwarfed by Altaïr’s seasoned hand and experience. He’s shaken up. By the huge strength of his arms, the unpredictable swerves and drifts of his hands, the rough touch where his fingers are calloused, the kindness of his fingers, the shallow breathing on his neck.

He is putty in Altaïr’s hands and there’s nothing else left for Altaïr than to reap the rewards Malik is leaving in the wake of his advance, his touch.

He bucks again, he is beyond hope but beyond begging also, but he hopes that Altaïr will turn to where he aches most for touch, and he does. And it’s heartbreakingly brief. It’s a gentle tap along his shaft, a teasing climb upwards and a tickle-like caress with the pads of his fingers across the tip, interrupted by a gush of pre-come and a breathy, nasal chuckle on Altaïr’s part. If a gentle tap and merest tickle can reap such rewards Altaïr is keen on seeing what results a firmer grip will yield. He acknowledges Malik’s cock as the epicenter of his attention but he wants to do what he’s wanted from the start, which is to widen his playground. To wheel through the expanse of skin available to him making all his appointed stops, to gauge what works, how similar Malik is in his tastes for pleasure, to uncover what gives him pleasure as well as what spots on his body are unusually sensitive.

He’s on treasure hunt.

He wastes nothing; in his creative fire Altaïr floods him with a deluge of touches completely unknown to him and, to Malik, one more spectacular than the next. Every touch aimed to make him feel as good as to return to Altaïr again craving touch.

Malik keeps his hands fisted in sheets, or on Altaïr’s knees, and that’s the extent of his courage to return touch, yet this—far from precluding modesty and reserve—lends a sunny something to Malik’s shyness, and the way he readily gives himself to Altaïr’s exploration despite the one-sidedness is the very protraction of his overall lure which attracts Altaïr. The day will come when Malik will return in kind and allow himself noise.

He’s stingy with moans. He doesn’t reward vainly either, but he is ever comfortable to the will of Altaïr’s hands. His skin is impressionable; every touch, every drag of fingers—hard or light—leaves trace on him. Altaïr doesn’t rest until he has mapped out the entirety of Malik’s upper body, until the youth has arched into every little pressure of his palms. Until he’s drunk on the feeling of his husband under his touch. His body is lean and soft in all the right places, his skin supple, yielding, scarless, dark, smooth. Different.

Altaïr knows himself to be responsive to a hint of pain and to being restrained, and while the latter is yet far out of his reach (chiefly because Altaïr enjoys binding others less than having ropes on himself) the former he can test on Malik’s body.

He works twofold; Malik arches his back shoving his chest into an awaiting hand in response to Altaïr’s pawing at his pert nipple and he solders his hand ruthlessly rolling it between calloused fingers at the same time as his other hand finds a soft, auspicious spot on Malik’s waist, and he pinches both spots hard enough to pass his pain threshold.

In response, he receives a flinch devoid of pleasure and a yelp of pain estranged from moans.

“ _What are you doing_?” Malik rasps at him hotly. He is beyond doubt not into pain.

Altaïr lodges an open-mouthed, wet kiss deep into the skin of his shoulder along with a gentle stroke of thumbs across the spots he’s abused, as tacit apology for his trial.

“Apologies,” he repentantly whispers into his ear hoping he hasn’t passed limits and chased Malik off, but Malik remains firmly seated between his thighs and awaiting to have his cock looked after, as he has been promised.

Altaïr had wanted to devote attention to both nipples but seeing the lukewarm reception, combined with Malik’s previous lack of interest in having them touched (he has appreciated the pressure of Altaïr’s hands on his waist more than the attendance to his nipples), he moves on to things more dear to Malik’s heart (and body) after dotting this finding down.

He rests one of his hands on Malik’s upper thigh with fingers curled around the fleshy softness of his inner thigh. His other hand slips lower snaking down to the base of his oiled shaft and below to squeeze his sack and roll it in the cup of his hand. With his thumb he smooths down the skin with long, sweeping strokes savoring the way it contracts from pleasure and Malik’s grip clamps down on his knees in the daze of bliss.

Altaïr renews efforts to stimulate the trade of touches between them. The trade remains one-sided despite his effort, but nothing escapes his attention. Neither the way Malik’s heart has sped up when Altaïr moaned in response to the clamp on his knees, nor the way he is avoiding touching his own cock as if waiting only for Altaïr to do it, or the way he is restraining himself to limit the contact of his hands with Altaïr’s body.

And especially not the way his cock jumped as Altaïr unwittingly trailed a thumb down the innocent strip of skin at the join of his groin and thigh. He slinks from his thigh completely then to knead and rub along this sensitive crease of his body thinking little of it, but he finds it an untapped source of stimulation—his first real jewel on treasure hunt. He leaves it for later exploitation, satisfied. Sack in his right, cock in left hand, Altaïr closes the fist firmly around his shaft at last and is pleased to find his length at its fullest. He descends on him almost brutally, paying attention to his pressure, the speed of the stroke as he pumps his fist in long, flowing, swift, connected strokes. Keeping a good pace, he releases his sack to coil his arm around Malik holding him square across his chest; the vigorous stroke is doing the intended trick and he repeats this intense up-and-down in a somewhat faster pace until Malik’s breathing, shallow and quick, erupts into a moan.

A heat in Malik’s groin and a warm tickle of pleasure so sweet that it seems to seep thick like honey into the rest of his body is replacing the ice and wood of his conscience and thawing what has previously been a silent, martyred mouth, and this mouth finally, _finally_ unwinds and the tender moan that leaves it melts down Altaïr’s chest and right into his groin and neglected cock as a simple-and-pleasant drug.

Malik’s constant pushing him away is just a fashionable mask. Unmasked, he gives himself up, as if the thick haze of lust that has descended on him has stripped him of all but the bare essentials of need.

There’s a lovely, subtle undulation of his hips, and before long Malik is thrusting into Altaïr’s firm grip with jaw unhinged and hints of moans upon lip. And though Altaïr’s amber eyes and keen ears follow every change in expression in his newly-developed appetite for Malik’s sighs and hunger for his cries of pleasure, he can’t see the damp dizzy warmth that spreads through Malik’s belly like wildfire, that in spite of his best attempts to snuff this fire Malik is quite, quite lost to the world and rutting into Altaïr’s fist without restraint.

He has managed to enhance Malik’s sexual experience by dint of skill only, and the thought alone engulfs him in equal pleasure; he takes a certain amount of pride in his craft, and the euphoria of proud toil.

The persistent bead of sweat trickling down Malik’s temple brushes against Altaïr’s own when he angles his head to find Malik’s face twisting up, eyes squeezed shut and mouth open as his bucking hastened, gaining an edge of urgency. Seeing that Malik has worked himself right up to the edge of an orgasm, Altaïr keeps on edging him towards the doorstep of the precipice, and then he claps the door shut.

The rhythm is off briefly before he stops in the middle of his fast and rough stroking and he closes his grip like a vice around the base, holding as he unsheathes his canines. His teeth are at the junction of Malik’s neck and shoulder next. Later, Altaïr will tell himself that this had been done in the heat of the moment to distract Malik from near-orgasmic euphoria, but it’s to mark him, as territory no one else should trespass.

It’s better like this. He wants to keep Malik in arms as long as it’s in his power to keep him there. The standard hard stroke he’s set him under can quickly lead to numbness from friction, or over-stimulation, and Altaïr wants him to succumb to neither just yet.

Malik evens his breath out, slowly, saying nothing. He’s still unmasked. He accepts the orgasm delay and the bite that’s too late to retract now. Altaïr sucks in the mouthful of bruised skin keeping his teeth out of the way and releases the seal with a smack when he feels Malik getting restless, then nurses it with his tongue, lapping up the bite mark that is reddened and will be turning purple. Far from the sole lasting effect, it leaves Altaïr wanting for something else after the barrage of soft, buttery kisses along the bruised spot.

He wants Malik’s mouth. A kiss. Touching his lips to Malik’s in place of merely zeroing in on his cock. He wants to glide oiled hands down his chest and have his mouth and full, wet lips, but he’s afraid to ask. And Malik won’t rectify this fear. To let Altaïr know that he is still in charge and will allow only as much as he feels comfortable with.

This is painfully apparent as Altaïr, deceived into transitory hope, seeing Malik’s parted mouth at such proximity, frames a clasp around his chin drawing his head to the side. He had hoped to ensnare him into a kiss while his body is still settling down, but this racy move, along with this sudden closeness of Altaïr’s lips near his, sets Malik off into a sudden physical response.

He unchains himself from Altaïr’s grip, and, instead of shooting forwards, Malik thuds the weight of his entire torso back against Altaïr’s tipping him over, and not merely that; having found purchase on the mattress and using the strength in his thighs, he keeps on driving Altaïr’s body backwards after that initial ramming into him, until Altaïr has nowhere else to maneuver off but allow himself to fall backwards into the sheets, landing head-right against the pillow with Malik sprawled atop his body.

It’s clear, after a moment of inaction, that this hasn’t been Malik’s instinct but intention.

Whether it’s Altaïr’s lack of access to his mouth in this position, the numb tingling in his thighs which have started to fall asleep after prolonged disuse, or simply Malik’s position preference, they settle into it with Altaïr reclining on back and Malik splayed on top of him.

There’s some shifting and a lot of tacit compromise before they can settle on whose limb will go where, and the poking matter of Altaïr’s erection squished beneath Malik’s rear, but (thankfully) he lifts his hips off enough that Altaïr can pull his cock onto free air. The affair of pulling it out from beneath Malik’s press of body leaves him with an even trickier dilemma—where with at after the liberation.

Altaïr keeps an arm wound round Malik’s waist (Malik seems to have grown a fondness for having it there) but his other hangs extended beyond Malik’s groin absurdly keeping his cock straight up and bent away from Malik’s groin. And in short, he hasn’t the foggiest idea where to position it as to not disturb Malik with its proximity.

Altaïr is not hiding his own arousal but he is paying it no heed either. He would cheerfully dismiss any personal troubles which ignoring his own arousal might entail as long as he keeps Malik satisfied and moaning.

With no warning, Malik’s slots his arm beside Altaïr’s tensed one as if he’s finally got this matter sussed, and extracts Altaïr’s hand away from his shaft quite suddenly letting his meaty cock slap down against the skin Altaïr had previously found to be incredibly sensitive, at the join of Malik’s thigh and groin. Altaïr offers a brief prayer to Gdila to keep him from humping his husband like this, but Malik seems to not have such concerns. He rolls himself more comfortably against Altaïr’s torso nestling the back of his head partly against Altaïr’s shoulder, partly against the pillow—whatever of it he can reach while propped up by Altaïr’s body like this.

He’s dodged the proximity of Altaïr’s lips to his thusly and he feels comfortable, and once Altaïr recovers from the sting of being denied a kiss, he sets his mind on snatching this comfort from him to swap it with pleasure again.

The position has not lost its charm, as not only is Malik’s weight negligible, but Altaïr is also exposed to every noise of Malik’s restless mouth since it seems closer to Altaïr’s ear than before.

He pries his grip from Malik’s waist trailing his fever-hot palms smooth down his sides all the way to his inner thighs, first bribing him into the comfort of thinking he’ll focus on his cock next, again, to finally finish what he’s started, but instead he slips into the bend of his knees to fold his legs up and apart. He is rewarded with a jolt for this sudden rearrangement of limbs; he knows he can easily pick Malik up or pin him down and Malik can't do a thing to counter it without tricks, but despite his strength, Altaïr is not the master of decisions in the bond between them. He is opening another possibility for him, offering to spread him open to boost the potency of his touch, hoping Malik won’t retract the offer.

Malik does remove the grip from the bend of his knees, but instead of joining his thighs between Altaïr’s, he hooks them behind Altaïr’s spread ones splaying himself open completely, just as the warrior has wanted.

Altaïr is unsure what lust is swelling inside Malik to make him—a fierce and locked creature—unlock and offer himself like this, but he seizes his chance, with Malik’s thighs tucked behind his, to attend to places he hasn’t properly taken care of.

Warming him up to it is the key. He reintroduces himself to his cock by running a few fingers up-and-down the underside of his shaft before gripping the base and tapping the tip against the oiled stretch of his awaiting palm in a few fat smacks, the way he’d smack against his own tongue had he sucked Malik off instead. To mix in tricks unfamiliar to Malik to keep breaking the tedium, he wraps a tight ring with thumb and forefinger round the base sliding it up to the base of his crown, and down, adding a twist to his stroking, and while the chance is ripe he returns to Malik’s sack again forming a gentle ring with his fingers and then slowly tugging down, away from the body.

Above, Malik is reduced to writhing and broken, disjointed breaths, and groping sheets. A thick trickle of pre-come is running down the back of Altaïr’s thumb and down Malik’s shaft when he makes a stop just below his glans. Altaïr is testing grounds. He’s migrated from his sack to the strip of skin right below it, kneading with the pads of his fingers, and he wants Malik to feel it without distraction. To take precautionary measures and staunch off rejection before it happens. He’s keenly interested in milking Malik’s prostate but he doesn’t know where the line is, he’s walking slowly, feeling his ground. Malik gasps a moan, and Altaïr is unsure if it’s a tacit demand for renewed stroking on his cock, or response to added pressure in his kneading, or the fact that he’s trailing lower.

To solicit a simple feedback, he tilts his chin to the side towards Malik’s ear.

“You like?” He asks, huskily, in the spirit of earnest bribery.

A quick-then-slow rub across the puckered skin of his hole earns him throaty moan that makes Altaïr’s gut churn with arousal.

“You want more?” he inquires in a coaxing overly-polite voice.

He awaits response, verbal or physical, in trepidation, oblivious to the fact that a feeling grows in Malik that he deserves something else, something bolder, something grander, something more thrilling than just Altaïr’s hand on his cock, something bristling or fiery or fierce, something that might give him insight into the man that is Altaïr. Altaïr is oblivious to it but he knows, the very moment Malik starts to bodily urge him on to continue, that he’s not yet ready to verbally voice it but having fingers inside him is something whose demands on Malik’s conscience are so small in comparison with the pleasure it offers.

“As long as you’re sure,” he whispers in an oddly thick voice, nuzzling into the sweat-glossed skin of Malik’s neck.

It’s a treat. Altaïr hopes that Malik won’t find the stimulation irritating. He’s ready to build gradually as long as it’s not painful, as long as Malik is of the type who enjoy being filled. And with that in mind, he turns to ministering to another kind of pleasure he thoroughly understands.

The oil is right to his left within his reach (owning to Malik’s deliberate pre-planning), and he thanks the gods it is, for he isn’t sure if Malik would have roused from the stupor of arousal during a chase for oil but he doesn’t want to find out now either. He dips his fingers to soak them in, he’s generous with it. It’s delightfully easy to ease his fingers down his cleft, to still against puckered skin and place the pad of a single finger against him and work him open in tight, gentle circles as a warm-up. It’s easier still to hear that he’s slightly breathless by the time Altaïr bears down a blunt pressure as he presses slick fingers against his hole.

“Breathe,” he whispers into Malik’s ear pulling the tight ring around his base up to the crown of his cock, “Keep breathing.”

It’s even easier to see that Malik is not a lazy pupil, he opens up to the lesson to pay attention to his breath and before long Altaïr is ever so slowly sliding in with the gentlest of pressures, until his push smooths out. Malik responds well to feelings of fullness and pressure; better still when Altaïr angles his plunge shrewdly to link two fingers and the joined stretch fills him up so well. He isn’t aiming for his prostate just yet. It’s not difficult with the abundant oil to push against him and dip in and back without removing his whole fingers—he doesn’t intend to add more than two and he pushes all the way in and rests them inside me for a while, until the soft firmness fits snugly around his fingers.

The first real motion—a thrust of fingers—jolts Malik into bucking up, and before Altaïr has properly worked his fingers in, Malik is pushing against him in search for a faster pace. It’s a race of two bodies and clash of two minds until Altaïr winds his free arm round Malik’s hips to pin him down. There is a groan, some angry fisting of sheets, and heated gnashing of teeth as uprising against this confinement of Malik’s movement, all of which Altaïr aims to counter with an assault of pleasure, and pushing his fingers into him deep, deeper, to the very knuckles of his wrist, Altaïr curls them into an appropriate bend pressing the pads of his fingers towards the front of Malik’s body in search of the right spot. And with a dram of patience, and an ounce of right pressure, he finds the swell of his prostate—it’s swollen, he’s aroused.

A simple, innocent brush against the spot and the sensation shoots through Malik like a lightning bolt. He arches up with a silent cry frozen on his lips, the small of his back snaps off Altaïr’s stomach with a sweaty smack. Keeping him shackled like this is difficult. He’s pushing for more instead of lying flat across Altaïr’s muscles, he’s stretching his thighs further apart in naïve hope to enhance his pleasure thus, and Altaïr has to press down on him to pacify his pitching hips. Until he’s cemented Malik to his own body once more he doesn’t remove his arm, and then, having reduced the impatient thrusting up, Altaïr decides to do something about Malik’s thighs—they are splayed stiff-and-tense because of Malik’s insistent spreading them apart to an uncomfortable degree and he won’t be able to relax and loosen into his finish.

So Altaïr tugs Malik up again by a grip below knees spreading his own thighs more to take their former place and maneuvers Malik into leaning his own thighs onto the interior of Altaïr’s while allowing him to keep them spread all the same (as he seems wont to do) without the added burden of a stretch.

With mind on ushering him into a grand finish, Altaïr returns to Malik’s groin raking the supple skin of his inner thighs with clawed hands, and while it’s not enough to leave bruises it’s sufficient to raise passing welts and pretty scratch marks.

And grasping Malik’s cock in the hand not filling him up knuckles-deep again, Altaïr finally leans his head back against the pillow to close his eyes and let Malik’s breaths, his body movement and moaning be his guide. Malik’s body is inviting. Tight, so hot, and slick. There’s no harsh pace when he eases inside Malik again, just a gentle-then-hard pressure, a constant circling rub with the pads of his fingers there and brushing against the swell here—he isn’t pounding away yet smashing Malik’s prostate with each stroke and rub; Malik is coming short of breath, but the hand on his cock is ruthless with hard, twisting pumps.

Malik’s cock is at an angle where pre-come can’t trickle down the underside of his shaft anymore; instead, it’s dripping off and pooling across his lower belly until it’s stippled with droplets and shapeless drips of thick pre-come.

Altaïr is stretching him full, driving him into overload with the hard strokes just fast and tight enough to give his cock all the friction he craves, and he all but lapses into velvety oblivion, lost. Helpless. He’s tossing off again. He’s thrusting into Altaïr’s hands fitfully, keening atop him, and nothing can be done at this point to ease his bucking.

Altaïr’s breaths have grown shaky and uneven, but nothing near Malik’s strained, erratic breathing.

He feels the confusion of Malik’s body physically—it’s unsure whether to grind back into his fingers or thrust up into the pumping grip of his fist—he feels him progressively turn into a bucking, gaspy, sweaty, moany mess. He wishes Malik could see his face, yet he’s happy that he can’t. His face is not presentable. He’s hungry for sex and touch as well, but ready to starve in exchange for a moment more of his husband’s complete abandon in his arms.

The untamed-but-constant thrust-up of Malik’s groin has started a side effect off-shoot Altaïr hasn’t expected, and every motion of this drags the upper side of Altaïr’s own cock along that sensitive join of Malik’s thigh and groin, and Altaïr has never until now been so sorely tempted to replace his fingers with cock. He knows the error of his desire, and it’s not only that his cock is considerably thicker than Malik could take now, but also that Malik is not yet ready to receive him, despite the wild fantasies Altaïr used to harbor prior to his return home. The heat, the slickness around his fingers and the welcoming loosening of Malik’s body makes him rut up into air vainly in response to the unintentional friction as he restricts himself to fantasy of easing his cock into the body asprawl atop his.

Altaïr swallows back any excess of saliva in his mouth to not choke on it, and then unwinds his tongue and thoughts:

”I’ll find out how you sound when someone is fucking you, and I’ll be inside you when it happens,” his voice is thick, but Malik’s moan of response is thicker, louder, ”I’ll fill you up in ways you _can’t imagine_.”

Whispers of filthy promises flow between them like Altaïr’s pre-come down Malik’s crotch and his breathing is shallow on Malik’s neck; he descends down it with light pecks morphing into harsh, insistent kisses towards his shoulder where he finds a mouthful of skin to suck on—he’s thrusting Malik towards the brink.

Malik doesn’t want to meet the precipice he’s nearing; he’s pushing himself up into Altaïr’s pumping fist and filling himself with Altaïr’s fingers, he’s in toe-curling bliss he’s unacquainted with; he’s on the edge of his blackened mind where reason has been pushed out into the outskirts, and on that very border of sanity he finds insanity where his mind is exposed only to the thought of having his husband’s cock inside him, the illusory feeling of getting fucked and begging and being owned and not being allowed to come at all.

He’s teetering on the brink when Altaïr’s fist tightens around the tip of his cock like a vice, milking him for release, he’s free-falling when the pressure inside his groin begins to contract, squeezing the flare of pleasure out towards the rest of his body.

 _I don’t want to come_ dangles from his mouth but he can’t even finish what he’s not started, he doesn’t even have a chance to gasp for breath let alone inform Altaïr that he wants his climax delayed before he comes undone.

The first spasm of Malik’s body Altaïr has been too sluggish to capture and savor; they come earlier than he’s expected and the cock in hand sends the first gush of Malik’s load across his belly to join the sticky mess he’d already left, but the rest he follows devotedly, with hand closed around the head of Malik’s cock to let his semen pool into his palm, but it overflows, dripping.

For what seems an eternity to Malik and a moment of time for Altaïr, Malik keeps riding out the aftershocks of his orgasm thrusting vainly into air in chase after the last tides of residual pleasure.

He slumps down across Altaïr’s torso like a discarded ragdoll with head steeply pitched over Altaïr’s shoulder—sweaty, sticky, warm. Spent. Glowing, in the aftermaths of a body-shattering climax.

He rests boneless atop Altaïr for many moments, recuperating until his breath evens out entirely and nothing but his lungs seems to work.

Teaching his limbs to move seems easier in comparison with getting his muscles to work, but he hoists himself up and topples to the side. They assemble themselves in a chorus of movements sitting up straight on the mattress—Altaïr on his hunches again and striking a bizarre image with hands soldered into loose fists on his knees and cock standing up, and Malik pulling a knee up as if to hide what Altaïr has already seen.

Arousal has taken its toll on Malik. He looks half-deranged; there’s tufts of his black hair sticking up all over the place making his hair unruly, a sweat-stained face, two dark, dazed eyes basking in the lunacy of something that Altaïr suspects is denial. If Malik had been red before, he glows crimson now beneath the sheen of sweat and his eyes appear stoned out of this world for a moment before he hugs his bent leg, clawing at knee and shin until the skin beneath his nails turns white from the strain.

Maybe he’ll raise a fuss.

He’s keeping his gaze fixed at the sheets they have crumpled and soiled together, he avoids his gaze.

Altaïr has thought that Malik needs a moment for piling up on bravado, for motivating himself to return the favor in requital for his good work. He knows that this has been an appetizer rather than a meal, but he hasn’t assumed that Malik will return with the same appetizer—perhaps a simple, inexperienced stroking of hand on his cock and nothing more—though he would have gladly taken more, had Malik only offered it. He has waited without anxiety, expecting him to not care for equal treatment at worst, but this is worse.

Altaïr has expected an earnest token of gratitude on Malik’s face. Instead, there is denial and embarrassment, as if he’s asking himself how he could have allowed Altaïr to touch him the way he had.

Altaïr hasn’t expected to receive unstinting praise (yet feeling Malik’s body in his arms would have been reward enough), but he has hoped that, maybe, he could hold Malik tonight like a true husband.

He sits motionless on his haunches with a palmful of Malik’s semen when the youth scrambles towards the foot of the bed to unroll the quilt, when he falls to his side firmly facing away, when he gathers up the entire bulk of _their_ quilt to wrap himself into a tight, distant, impenetrable cocoon.

Altaïr hasn’t expected to find his husband fully responsive, but he has wanted to smooth fears over with a mellow, coaxing voice.

Altaïr hasn’t expected any, _any_ of this.

When Altaïr later returns to bed the oil lamp has gone out and there is not a scrap of the quilt left free of Malik’s annexation to cover himself with, only the edge of a soiled, damned sheet on his side of the bed. The cocoon around Malik is so massive that he can’t see him breathe beneath it.

Malik is turning his back now, but he will return to him for more. Oh he will. And Altaïr vows to be there to give it to him again, better, until he has no place left to hide his indignant dignity.

He falls asleep cold, with a barren hand devoid of Malik’s touch.

 

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> No full dicking yet because Malik needs time to ripen to have his cherry popped, right? Right.
> 
> The stage will broaden again for the next chapter, exciting stuff, lost bets, secret lovers, and our last main character (Rauf) enters the play as well. It shall be fun. Fighting a writer’s block with writing, though, is as effective as it is slow...


	11. Chapter 9

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Almost sure that all readership is gone, but I'll keep posting publicly anyway.
> 
> I’m not sure if people will realize this and it’s important to me so I’ll say it here: you’ll notice that people are **getting into conflict and fighting in Rauf’s presence** , because he represents the god(ess) of war. BUT it’s not always a bad kind of fighting, often it’s healthy because things that are repressed within people come to surface and people resolve issues they usually try to avoid. Kinda similar to the weather in the city, which changes according to Lucy’s mood because she represents the goddess of wind.

 

 

 

* * *

 

 

The sun has risen and it’s hard to tell that it has.

Clouds have gorged themselves on darkness and descended upon the city in a fury, much like two pale eyebrows descend upon Lucy’s eyes when she spots the warrior shielding the doors of her wing intrusively.

The reason of his coming is absent. Until she catches sight of a sack, that is, deposited against the side of a wall. It must be the armors she has ordered returned. Three complete, well-used armors, each missing an item. A nostalgic luxury she had allowed him in the throes of a good mood.

“I came to return the arms,” Desmond explains, as if on cue. His warrior sword is strapped at his side and a smirk strapped to the very corner of his mouth. He’s taunting. He knows keeping the swords is out of question.

Utter silence answers him.

She says nothing, reveals nothing, gives him no backchat, not even a word. He stands in her way but it’s not an obstacle she can’t evade, and so she proceeds, marches on, refusing to meet his eye.

Desmond shimmies sideways, blocking her path momentarily. Lucy fixes him with a fiery stare. It’s a wicked thing, Desmond’s audacity. Attractive, much like the gleam of mischief in his eyes while he stands in her way, taunting her into a response.

She sidesteps again, wordlessly. He follows, sidles in to cut into her path before she can think of reaching the locked double-doors.

Her eyes flash at him, hotly. She sees that she can’t avoid the farce of a chase this time, so she grows roots, fixing herself to the spot.

The wait seems to go on forever.

He tilts his head, with purpose. His gaze slithers down, looking at her intently—not into her eyes, but the lower pan of her face. From here, the road towards her mouth slopes gently down, guiding him slow enough that she can react before they touch lips.

This time he’s not surprised by the slap across his cheek.

At last, the door of her anger has unhinged. In retrospect, it’s not an anger linked to Desmond’s attempt to kiss her, it’s an anger that remembers his insult from last time—words that her pride couldn’t digest to the point of forgiveness. Even this anger is exaggerated, bloated to hide the horror of horrors: that she appreciates his attentions, the way he approaches her.

Gradually, he turns his head to restore the gaze, impervious to the smack of her ice-cold palm.

If he thinks she is opposed to this, he’s strangely naive; he doesn’t, and he’s not. Still, he doesn’t want to be the first one to budge.

He stands before her and applies himself to complete silence with the same, untouched determination in his eyes. She is disappointed that he’s given up, though he hasn’t. He is only taunting, again, and waiting for her to open a new chapter.

“You don’t seem to know much about women, do you?” she taunts in kind.

“I’m only interested in one,” he answers the jibe honestly, stroking her cracked pride.

Lucy looks at him from under her lashes and there’s nothing bashful about it. She listens in on what her gut is whispering, hears that knowable flare-up that spreads when her body wants a cock in it.

She breaks his expectations—perhaps hers as well—when her eyes flit downwards to regard not his crotch but the weapon he carries but shouldn’t.

“What are you keeping for yourself?” she questions, her voice soused in slyness as she continues to evade, trying to profit from the fact that he’s stubborn to the bone, that he might try again.

He taps noiselessly against his hip to divert her attention towards the easily-overlooked scarlet sash. An incurable scowl crumples her brow for a moment. What an odd choice. A warrior sash. Its absence from the sack will hardly be noticed.

“I thought you’d beg me for this,” she says, touching the hilt of his sword. Though she had allowed Desmond and his two friends to keep one item each, she had expected the weapons returned from the start. She rubs shoulders with Al Mualim in terms of power, but even she can’t cover up any missing swords.

“You can keep it.” Desmond unstraps the belt, dragging the sword off in tandem. It’s entrusted unto her, and the moment it passes into her hand the side of his mouth pulls into a smirk, “But you touched a warrior sword. You know what to expect now.”

Lucy knows, of course. The consequence of touching a warrior’s sword, that beloved old tradition.

“Which will it be? Death or kiss?” He has the right. She’s touched it while it had still been in his possession.

In contrast with explaining the absence of three armor items, this problem is comparatively easy to solve.

“You ask much.“

“I give more.“

Cornering her against a wall proves easier with her hands employed with holding the sheathed sword. They’re haggling for space for an instant, Desmond chaining her to the wall by the waist and Lucy tossing the sword sideways to shackle a hand to his throat when he leans in to steal the overdue kiss. He’s blocked in the lurch, considering retreat as a last resort when Lucy shoots up to clutch at the crown of his head, forcing him to his knees with ease.

“Let’s see what you can give then,“ she says drily and smooths her splayed hands on either side of his handsome face.

This sample of her thoughts immediately puts his hands to working.

He lifts her gown. The gauzy cotton pools along his wrist as he inches it up, past her knees, up over her creamy pale thighs, fingers pinching the lacy hem. His amber eyes meet her blues squarely; then he pulls the gown over his head, vanishing from sight. Lucy’s shoulders find purchase on the wall as she leans against it, smiling slowly and predatorily when she reaches down to cradle the back of his head, clutching at his hair as she guides his mouth between her thighs—a tacit instruction that he follows obediently.

“ _Oh_. You pretty fucker,“ she breathes out, appending her slur with a wanton moan. Her syllables are thickened by arousal, she’s pulling tighter on his nape to still his mouth and hold his head in a place she prefers, “That’s where you belong, soldier. On your knees, with your filthy mouth between my thighs.”

Desmond moans in appreciation of her obscenity.

It’s nice to imagine that she will shatter into pieces under his attention. It’s nice, but Lucy likes to keep the reigns in her hands and Desmond will allow her this illusion.

A muscle in the back of her thigh jumps as he slithers around it, cupping her ass and squeezing in earnest—a selfish grope he hazards while spreading her thighs to make more room for himself. She lifts her leg instead, daintily toeing off one of her velour flats to cushion her bare heel against the bulk of muscles rippling across his shoulder-blade.

His mouth is on her the moment she settles, lapping up her sex until she’s slicker than before he’d attended to her. There’s nothing gentle, languid, soft in this. He works industriously, with a purpose, devoid of shame, until saliva is running down his chin. He works with the particularly ambitious task of bringing her to the precipice embarrassingly fast.

Lucy is not shy about where she wants his attention. She bears down on his nape, digging nails into skin, rolls her hips along to the motion, and he obliges.

He hasn’t self-aggrandized when he advertised his skill earlier. He has a knack for pleasing women and it could only be the result of a man who is a natural or one who’s had opportunity to practice around, and whatever the case is, Lucy decides to put his gifted-or-trained mouth to good use, perhaps make him stray less if he satisfies.

She guides him further down, to the source of her torment. It’s her last coherent action before Desmond allows two fingers into his mouth, coating them with saliva. He glides up his careful, _fast_ , well-meaning fingers into her and she rocks into him, moaning a _yes_.

However she groans and bucks against his pace to further her pleasure, he knows without knowing where she likes it, where to push, where her breath morphs into a hitch, how much pressure to rub into her clit. Soon his fingers are fucking frantically against the rocking of her hips until she’s chewing on her lip, the dirtiest moan he had ever heard tumbling past them. Her teeth ease off then, her mouth falls open, a gasp halts in its roots as she silences herself quickly; he welcomes her climax with his fingers fixed to the last knuckle inside her and the pad of his thumb rubbing languidly across her clit to help her ride the aftershocks out until she’s spent.

That’s been fast; Desmond smiles to himself, triumphantly, and wipes the trail of excess saliva off his chin, to present himself flawlessly as he rolls his shoulder down to shrug off her leg and straighten up.

“Want some head?” She asks breathlessly, tugging at the drawstring of his breeches for emphasis.

Despite the itch of interest that passes through his hardened length with a pleasant jolt, he pulls her dress up by the front to guide the other hand down and slide two slickened fingers inside her.

“I’d rather have some of this,” he says throatily, curling his fingers, pressing against her overworked clit in tandem with this movement.

She bucks into him prettily. Chuckles. Curves the side of her mouth into an impish grin as she toes her other velour flat off without Desmond noticing, “Well then. Catch me, soldier.”

She removes his hand with a sudden slap to his wrist.

As light as the wind, she clasps a hold of his shoulders, pulling herself up in time with clamping her thighs around his middle. Her small, supple breasts mesh snugly to his hard chest after she settles against him. Desmond is accustomed to battle-hardened bodies of women he used to sleep with, not the soft tenderness of female flesh untouched by battle. He can’t help but notice just how much less Lucy weighs than a wounded comrade. It’s easy to lift her, cradle her up in his arms with a quick pull-up—not because she’s thin, but because his arms are used to heavier burdens.

Lucy’s smile has a hint of smugness to it, and a tad of afterglow. Her arm loops more securely against his neck before she shifts snaking a hand down, to pull the drawstring of his breeches open. Soon, they’re undone, and she’s freeing his cock from the confines with a good, solid jerk. She tugs at the drawstring again, tightening it below his sack, to keep the breeches from slipping off.

She lets him lift her then and pulls him by the cock to slide the thick head along her sex, trying to guide him in, but Desmond hoists her up higher around his middle just when she expects, _wants_ , him to lower her.

“Just so you know: I’m not a soldier,” he says, using the suspension to tease, though quite unsure who of the two he’s teasing.

“Let me down. Warrior.” She tags the word on, after a brief delay.

His smirk finds audience in her, but she sanctions it without reprimand. He lowers her enough to allow her to align him, and then she lets this god of a man ease her right down and fills herself full of his cock. He forces her down to the base, earning a moan of unveiled appreciation.

His smirk flattens. She’s warm and slick, her tightness gripping his cock, and whatever humor had filled him at her quick climax disperses when he feels the pinpricks of an orgasm tickle his belly after only several thrusts. He can’t even draw it out, though he wishes he could.

“Don’t delay, I’ve work to do.” She’s reading him like an uncoiled scroll. She will enjoy him, but without the intention to finish, he quickly realizes.

“If you finish inside I’ll have you unmanned.”

“Wouldn’t dream of it.”

He doesn’t leave anything to gravity. He bobs her up-and-down against his thrusts and she rocks back against him so insistently that he forgoes any prelude of gentleness to fuck her rough and hard, harder, until he’s thrusting into her with a _vengeance_. Until the slickness of their join becomes louder than their breaths and Desmond’s thrusts morph into smacks of skin, what for the sweat, what for the sloppiness of his lifts which arises from an overuse of muscles.

His arms are starting to go numb and he slows to a halt, only slightly winded at that point.

He needs leverage.

The moment he transfers them away from the high, shielding wall towards the strip of the semi-wall that lends a view of the inside of the citadel, he summons the last shreds of his strength, propping a foot onto a notch cutting the semi-wall in half to regain balance, and begins to slam up into her in earnest.

One wrong lift or a miscalculation in movement, and they would both tumble down the precipice of the semi-wall; one wrong sound or a stray moan and the mercenaries circling the grounds below would look up. Yet Lucy can’t bring herself to care past the conventional hope that she won’t fall down the abyss, because Desmond’s arms are tight around her and his cock is hot inside her and it’s been a while since she’s been this close to anyone.

Her breath rolls across his skin, a hot patch cooling in the brisk morning air, then warming up with each little puff of her rugged panting. Desmond looks her in the eyes seeing her cheeks rosy with exertion and he feels his mind fog over.

He grunts as he lifts her higher, allowing his cock to slip out, obliging her request. He has them transferred back against the high wall by the time he comes across its cool stone and she watches his face split, his brows crease in the throes of a climax. She lets him settle down, without relinquishing her position, and jots down a reminder to have a servant clean the mess he’s left across the wall.

She unhooks both legs from his waist, landing on bare feet.

“Can you give me some date or do I keep popping up unannounced, hoping to find you walking past here?” He probes as he tucks himself in sluggishly, to spend a moment or two longer in her presence.

“I’ll send for you,“ she says succinctly between slipping her dainty flats back on her feet.

Her body is tender, appreciative of the satisfying contentment that courses thick through her veins. She’s so distracted by this misfortunate pleasure that she remembers, far too late, to follow Desmond’s exit.

By the time she rushes to bend across the serrated semi-wall where he had fucked her soundly moments ago, he’s gone.

He’s gone, and Lucy is still in the dark as to how he manages to find his way inside the citadel without being detected.

 

* * *

 

 

Altaïr wakes with nothing in his hand. And nothing in his bed.

He hears a wayward pop of an otherwise peaceful fire. Its warm, woodsy smell suddenly blends with a gentle waft of freshly baked bread that floods his mouth with saliva and for a brief moment envelops him into a homey sense of belonging.

He stretches noiselessly, luxuriating in all the space he has to himself.

Malik is in the kitchen, if his hearing is to be trusted; he finds his guess correct after he heaves himself up and plops head-first onto the foot of the bed—a tactical viewpoint from which one could peek through the double-ended fireplace without leaving the bed.

The fire is bustling, if small, and beyond it Malik’s calves are basking in its glare and the flame is licking at his heels. He is fixed to the spot and Altaïr is unsure what chore is keeping him there, but he’s oddly glad that he has not woken up to an empty home.

He ponders morosely over what happened last night, then sighs a mournful little sigh, and pulls himself out of bed. On his way to the adjacent kitchen—a path he conquers without a hint of noise—he offers a quick prayer to [Hiba](http://the-king-of-novices.tumblr.com/post/105028879746/live-forever-or-die-trying-the-pantheon-310) with the hope that tonight his hand won’t be empty.

He peeks past the corner of the strip of wall dividing the bedroom and the kitchen (anything but a peek will draw Malik’s attention to his presence) and he looks his husband over with a solitary smile.

Malik’s hair is swept up into a tangle and he stands there with the kitchen counter impressed into his hip and looks every bit the surly-looking youth with unkempt hair and a moody pout that he is. On the counter there are several smallish buns and a bigger loaf of bread that’s positively steaming, and Altaïr has joined in just in time to watch him wrap the loaf into clean cloth before he attends to the buns to fix himself an impromptu breakfast.

Altaïr’s eyes embark on a quick raid for signs of last night. He assesses Malik’s body finding the marks of a love-bite on his shoulder, the purple bloom of a hickey on the column of his neck—one of the most prominent ornaments among a collection of smaller ones to accentuate it.

He admires it, this state of Malik’s body in the wake of his attentions, unaware that he’s seeing only part of it.

What’s hidden from plain sight is the strained muscle in Malik’s neck and the soreness of his abdomen as a result of overstretching atop Altaïr, the scratch marks along his inner thighs, the pleasant numbness in his body converged mostly around his crotch, the tenderness of his raspy throat overexerted by moans, the parts of him where pre-come and semen have been allowed to dry overnight and blend with the residue of oil, the rawness of joints and knuckles that he’d strained pawing sheets and Altaïr’s body—a sensation that reminds Malik of the first days of intense washing on the water well—and least but hardly last, the tender state of his foot that now basks in a haze of dusty firelight that licks across his heels like orange tongues.

All combined, they add up to a colorful variety ranging from vaguely pleasant to highly disagreeable impressions of a night that Malik is trying to forget.

Altaïr stares until thoughts of last night dissolve and he begins to consume here-and-now, and he leans more heavily against the wall, faithfully following Malik’s antics.

The smoothness of his slices as he halves the buns; the way he’s added a handful of grains and oats to upset the austere purity of an otherwise white bread; the way the smooth line of his mouth lifts itself at corners at the crunch of the freshly-baked crust; the way he struggles with spreading a copious spoonful of jam until it has thinned out and the chunks of peach have blended, though not flawlessly, with the clotted cream of the jam, until Altaïr can almost taste their tartness on the warmth of the steaming flesh of the bread; the curious way in which he imprints a whole half of a walnut into the center until it glues itself to the bun.

There is a lot to take in and absorb into Altaïr’s overall study of his husband but Altaïr sweeps it aside to watch him consume the fruits of his morning labor. He eats tirelessly until he reaches the walnut, making sure to swallow in an orderly manner Altaïr remembers from Malik’s childhood, and then, suddenly, he begins to eat furtively, thrusting morsel by morsel into his mouth and stuffing them into the hollows of his cheek before he even gets to chew on them.

It’s almost as if he’s afraid of Altaïr waking to find him before he has a chance to elope and leave home.

Altaïr feels entertained by this alone and feels that he could watch his husband all day and find something to amuse him. He thinks of this and makes the novice mistake of issuing a laugh in the form of a brief, nasal breath, because it’s more likely than not to reveal his presence with this sound.

And it happens; Malik suddenly grows aware of his company and his being watched, turns his head to look at the warrior. Altaïr’s presence roots him more firmly to the spot. He ceases eating and then slowly swallows down the surplus he’s stashed away into his cheek.

Altaïr is met with a sober mind and a staid, unwelcoming face as he unfurls himself from the wall.

“Hello.”

“Goodbye,” Malik mutters, marking the utter lack of interest in holding a conversation with him.

Malik’s hip bangs against him when he moves past to pass him by; he’s through the door before Altaïr can turn around to utter a question.

Malik is silence and bad temper this morning and Altaïr feels as though he himself is to blame for suddenly landing himself into an atmosphere of judgment, petty spite, and evasion. Discomfort is at the bottom of it.

Persuading Malik into intimacy for one night is, in the long run, flawed. Because it’s not a clever stratagem to gorge himself to the bursting point with Malik’s body at night and remain underfed for the rest of next day.

He swears vilely, unsure whether to shoot ahead to chase after and attempt smoothing things out or leave it be until Malik’s body craves his touch again (as it’s inevitably bound to happen). He’s on the verge of going for the former by the time he heads outside and at the door he nearly collides with Desmond who urges him out of home with a clap on the back and wine in hand, and Altaïr allows himself to be whisked off into the city instead.

As though by some chance coincidence, at the foot of the hill they stumble upon Ezio carrying an oddly-shaped wrapping, but despite the stubbornness of their imploring encouragements to join them, Ezio resumes the path uphill that they’ve just left behind, insisting that other matters have drawn his attention.

They go on as two.

 

* * *

 

 

“You did _what_?!”

This outcry is a fusion of two, and the fact that he’s even being questioned on this subject impacts Malik less than the realization that the outcry is issued by Leonardo and Salai in unison, that their astonishment is mirrored, and this makes Malik question himself.

Questioning himself is by far worse than being questioned and so he says nothing and thinks nothing, hoping to avoid the horror that is self-blame.

“If I understood this correctly,” Leonardo starts when it becomes apparent that Malik won’t break words first, “you used him for your own pleasure and subsequently discarded him?”

“You _said_ I could rule him—”

“ _Malik_.”

Malik’s mouth cuts itself off and snaps shut before he utters anything, his chin drops atop his knee, his gaze plummets shamefully towards the floor. Still, he remains sitting comfortably on the round stool across the table where Leonardo and Salai are doing some quilting, with one leg raised and propped on the edge of the stool, his other leg dangling off the seat and bare foot grazing the floor.

He knows he should have at least put sandals on before storming out, or cleaned himself first, or dressed properly, but he awoke with a great appetite and a hungry belly to feed. And after this, doing what he always does in some grand predicament has taken precedence, and that is running off to Leonardo for advice. Salai’s happened to be here as well. Malik is mildly surprised that Salai is stitching along, since he does it so rarely (owing to laziness rather than absence of skill). Salai’s sole job, besides ordering the supplies and keeping Leonardo company, is to stand around in the studio and look pretty, and she performs this to perfection.

Though Malik came for the purpose of seeking advice, he finds himself shunning it now.

“Malik?”

Malik takes mercy upon a stray, fallen thread beneath his foot and stops knocking it out against his heel and glances up, wary. Whatever is coming is nothing he’s come here to hear.

“You do not treat people like that, not even your husband.”

“What was I supposed to _do_?” He’s irritable and bold enough to reveal it.

“Thank him for the attentions he bestowed upon your body? Show a dram of gratitude, if you were disinterested in returning touch in kind? Let him hold you?” Leonardo staves off further examples after seeing that Malik is stifling a scoff. He’s reluctant to waddle into this particular topic.

“Anything but what you did,” Leonardo wraps up in time to slap the back of Salai’s furtive hand that has dared to sneak up towards the bowl of dried figs while Leonardo’s been busy eyeing Malik.

The air of chastisement aimed at Malik is ironically broken by this chastisement of Salai’s sneaky antics, and Malik is glad that the thread of the conversation is broken.

The act has been done purposefully. It’s hard to imagine otherwise. Salai, along with Malik, knows that Leonardo loathes receiving customer complaints about sticky garments and preventing Salai from eating during work is the safest way to avoid this unpleasantry. The smack has been more loud than hurtful and Salai rubs the back of her assaulted hand for theatrics before she resumes quilting. When Malik looks at her, the arched corner of Salai’s painted lip smacks of mischief that has less to do with appetite and more with compassionate camaraderie.

Malik’s mouth pulls up into a matching smile and his knee does nothing to hide it.

“Just what do I do with you…?” Leonardo grumbles affectionately, dropping the subject. It’s unsure whether he’s referring to Salai or Malik, or both, whether he means Malik’s stubbornness or Salai’s aiding Malik through deliberate interruption.

Though Leonardo’s intentions are noble and pragmatic, Salai feels better where the line is that Malik isn’t yet comfortable crossing. For a moment the warm glow in Malik’s chest burns brighter than the flame in the fireplace behind his back and he is reminded of his childhood—the rare fragments of it he can recollect with a fond memory.

The days when he and Salai—two orphans taken in by a tenderhearted eccentric—used to huddle up by this very fireplace with their backs to the flame, their bare toes deep in the woolly fuzz of the sheepskin spread out beneath them, the flicker of fire reflecting itself on the tea things laid humbly upon the mossy fleece as they followed the bob of Leonardo’s needle, the pull of his thread. The scents of a cheerfully burning hearth and cups of strong herbal tea on a background of lavender and leather, the smiles that used to split their faces as they flicked between themselves a stray, fallen wooden bead with a hole through the center, the childish secrets hidden in a haystack of idle prattle that always came to a hush when Leonardo gave them a completed shirt or tunic to fold into a square, the babyish squabble over the side of bed away from the window when they shared Leonardo’s bed on stormy nights.

Nothing had made him happier than being a child beneath the veil of forced maturity that he’d been compelled to adopt for survival. What amounts to the sum of his childhood are these fragments, Mary’s motherly touch, a handful of blurred years while he still had a mother and a brother to sit on the other side of his harp that burned down to nothing but char, just as his innocence.

Altaïr is not his family. Altaïr is not even part of his childhood. Malik wonders whether he wants him as part of his future at all. He wonders if Altaïr would ever let him go. He wonders if Altaïr will ever be anything other than a source of income or the source of torment. He broods over these questions, not expecting to find an answer. Not here. Not now.

He lowers his leg to floor and feels the stickiness along his belly.

“I need a good, long bath…” he announces over the silky swish of needles threading through quilt.

“Salai will help you with the water,” Leonardo says, gesturing at Malik’s healing foot and Malik doesn’t decline, because he will allow Leonardo the much-beloved vice of caring for others, “I swear I will finish that damned pump one day and everything will be different…” he trails off speaking to no one in particular. Malik concludes that he’s referring to one of his many partial inventions and decides to abstain from meddling in that matter.

Salai is long past the door by the time Malik pulls himself up from the stool. He is half-way through the door when he’s interrupted and it’s unfair—Leonardo is using Salai’s absence to his advantage.

“Will you at least apologize to him?”

A look of dismay creeps over Malik’s face and when he finds his voice it’s laced with indignation, ”He offered me insult, I won’t reward it with swift apology.”

Leonardo shakes his head—a gesture distinctly softened by the smile on his face—and doesn’t confront him about it.

Malik is so taken with pouting at Leonardo that he almost runs into Ezio and they nearly collide in the doorway.

As they stand there eyeballing each other with mutual undiluted dislike, Malik’s first impulse is to stand in Ezio’s way and bar his entrance to Leonardo’s studio, but Ezio sidles up to the door-frame and they resume their separate courses without interfering with each other’s path.

He leaves Ezio behind and strolls out early enough to see Salai dart out from the boiling-room with the first bucket of hot water and watch her dress caress the first stairs as she scales the tunnel-staircase. He hopes Altaïr is not home.

He leans on the balustrade of the first ring-floor raking his eyes over the roused community, deciding to wait for Salai and gather more intelligence about his husband’s whereabouts, when all of a sudden an unfamiliar figure rushes in hurriedly taking off the hood of their wet cloak that must have rebelliously made its way through the dawn’s torrential rain.

Malik recognizes him as a messenger rather than a visitor.

And not the usual messenger either. Not the corpulent, mature man they are used to, the one who brings them tidings of market prices, market advertisements, social gatherings, local news that are collected by the elderly long before he reaches their courtyard.

It’s a new herald, a young man unacquainted with their community.

The monotony of his garb speaks of no rank and Malik assumes him to be a hired herald. Malik vaguely wonders who is possessed of so much coin as to hire a messenger for such an extended period of time. The one time when Malik had rented a herald to advertise his skills to a handful of communities, it had cost him an arm and a leg.

The figure draws their attentions with a lifting of one arm and suddenly everything falls to neglect as heads turn to him.

“Citizens!” his voice booms in a crescendo unexpected of such a meek little man, “Our leader and protector, Al Mualim, calls for a general assembly! To be attended by every able citizen! To be held before the temple! One sunrise henceforth! On the hour of The Forest! I repeat—!”

He shouts on, chasing the corners of the courtyard and winding corridors of their community until his voice has reached the very flanks of the upper ring and mingled with the variegated chorus of whispers that it has caused.

Why an assembly? Why now? What is he up to? We have no leader. We never did. Nor will we. Not until The Prophecy comes to life.

Malik thinks of this and wishes he wouldn’t, wishes his jaw wouldn’t scrunch into a clench of teeth at the very mention of Al Mualim’s name, wishes his belly wouldn’t clamp with a sudden thirst for revenge.

‘ _He’s here. You may still kill him. He might not be protected at the assembly_ ,’ stabs itself into his very heart and the sour reek of this possibility smells almost-good to him.

A hand latches onto his shoulder.

“Greetings.”

His head swerves towards the source of the voice, finding Claudia; jaunty Claudia with her lank hair tied, plaited, and arranged into a handsome crown-braid.

They exchange looks of tender recognition, and when this is not enough Malik extends his arm for her to grasp at the elbow, and she envelops him into the darkness of her cloak that look so much like his own. Malik is comfortable with the hold and they remain thus, even as he restores his earlier stare, watching as the herald echoes his announcement for the last time, then makes a dash for the tunnel, exiting their community’s courtyard to run up to the next.

“You hate him,” Claudia says, as if it’s nothing new she’s discovered, “I see it in your eye. The tensing of your jaw. But you won’t reach past hatred, even now, when he’s back.”

Malik looks at her as she looks away into the distance and he thinks he might have seen something on her face, a sadness, or grief, or hollowness—a squash of expressions that look so distinct-and-alike that he can’t tell them apart.

“I hate him too,” she throws in casually, almost as an afterthought.

“Al Mualim?” Malik asks in whispers and Claudia is grateful for his discretion as she responds with the smallest of nods. With the warm protection of her cloak to compare to, Malik’s other arm suddenly feels chilly.

“I hate what he’s made my brother into.”

“Into what?”

“A slave to lies. One that despises his own creator.”

“[Nokem](http://the-king-of-novices.tumblr.com/post/104486337526/live-forever-or-die-trying-the-pantheon-110)?” Malik asks dumbly and remembers that they are both, that all _three_ of them, are children of the same father. She doesn’t need to nod this time.

“What should we do to unveil the lies?”

Claudia issues a breathy laugh to convey her humorless amusement and Malik suddenly feels like a child.

“The questions is: should we do it?”

“Why not? If only we found enough allegiances—“

“Are you tired of life?” Claudia cuts him off before his hopes can soar, and his face falls. Her grip on the soft lining of skin along his inner elbow tightens to remind him that they’re conjuring fantasies.

“I’m tired of life in lies.”

Malik hasn’t expected it, but his words smite her. And as though their simple profoundness has cuffed her across face, she fastens a half-curled hand across her mouth and it does nothing at all to hide the pained crease of her brows. She can’t even look him in the eye.

Claudia, too, has been living in lies overmuch, for far too long. Malik feels guilt for finding fuel in her misfortune, but the desire for revenge that bubbles up the pit of his belly is born of the knowledge that, for all his misery, he is not alone.

“Give your suspicions voice and he will listen to it. There’s no one else he will listen to than you,” Malik’s gaze trails off to the familiar door where he has last seen the warrior, “He might listen to Leonardo, in time. You are not alone.”

“It’s easier to deceive someone than convince someone they’re being deceived,” she imparts unto him this impromptu adage and she’s back to her old cheery self and a smile is lurching to her uncovered face and Malik is unsure whether they have any kind of agreement. But it matters less, because he’s one more friend less lonely. She flattens the pad of her thumb into the vein on his inner elbow and for a moment their pulse seems to overlap and run parallel.

Her lip tugs itself up at the side crinkling her left eye and the look of mischief quickens his pulse and distorts the match.

“Try to be gentler with your husband.”

And just like that, Malik’s mirrored grip falls lax at this unexpected switch of topics.

“He may not be an ideal husband, but he’s not evil. His soul is not rotten.”

“You say that but... he works for Al Mualim,” Malik protests, aware that his excuse is feeble at best because it’s no longer true.

“Not anymore,” she corrects in a singsong pitch. Malik almost feels embarrassment at being caught in a lie.

“How do you know that?”

“I know many things.”

Malik has no doubts she does. Claudia is a vagrant with her finger on the pulse of the city and all that traverses within it.

She regards him with her unwavering smile and imprints her finger into his skin to leave an echo of her presence after departure, as a reminder of her advice. She releases him and disappears in Mary’s general direction.

Into the cacophony of whispers.

 

* * *

 

 

“So what exactly are we after?”

“Weapons,” Desmond explains laconically as they plow through the wayward stream of people pouring through the tunnel of Barzel’s market. They’re headed inside. He leads the way and Altaïr follows without probing for specifics.

“Here,” Desmond announces proudly as they come to a stand before the marble block with the carved market map. Altaïr takes his cue, dropping gaze to where Desmond’s knuckle is knocking against the very tip of a corridor situated to their left. “The best bladesmith you’ll ever find. But on the off chance—slim, I grant you—that there’s a better man, it’s not within this city.“

“How heavy does he expect my purse to be for a decent sword?” Altaïr questions but finds himself increasingly less and less interested in poring over the map as a meaty scent of food wanders into his nostrils, reminding his belly that it’s ravenously hungry.

He glances sideways, furtively, finding its source in the hand of a hungry man to his right who is obscenely chomping what appears to be a sausage wrapped in a shawl of bread.

Though he would have rather had the same breakfast as Malik, he doesn’t want to return to an empty home, and it doesn’t take him much to persuade Desmond to make a brief detour and grab a bite. The voracious man is helpful enough to inform them about the origin of his food pointing to a circling vendor who orbits the colossal statue of Barzel at recurrent intervals, selling ready-to-eat food.

Together the two warriors mange to hunt down the girl touting her roasted sausages after stalking her half a circle round the statue.

It’s a very charming and thoughtless girl with hazel eyes and plaited hair who won’t touch Altaïr’s money with her hand. She unbolts, instead, the willow basket that’s strapped to her nape, partitioned into two chambers, and she points to the chamber holding her cargo of earned coins to encourage him to deposit his metal inside. The other pocket is lined with and papered over by clean cloth insulating the sausages—the few that are left.

In their brief exchange she happens to mention that she’s the only one selling food in an otherwise foodless market and that her old man runs a cook-shop in one of the remotest corners of a corridor, that they sell porridge, stew, flatbreads of near-infinite varieties—filled with meat, fish, vegetable, mushroom, rabbit, and more—that their loyal customers are the shopkeepers and artisans of the market, that she needn’t do this but it gives her some bizarre joy to orbit the statue throughout the day to bait floating customers.

Altaïr catches himself coveting her openness for his own husband by the time she finally hands him the purchase. He doesn’t want to lay the blame on Malik alone, but he feels that more openness on Malik’s part would save their marriage the rocky path they’re currently trudging.

They walk on and Altaïr peeks into the folds of the flatbread finding the sausage previously disguised by a coating of some sort of angry-red hot sauce and he almost contemplates returning to ask for a bare sausage innocent of any condiments; yet, after a quick reevaluation of this impulse, he concludes it to be more reasonable to rehabilitate his tongue to spice and seasoning that have evaded his palate for so long. For the sake of his marriage, it now seems more reasonable to Altaïr to assimilate rather than expect Malik to adjust his cooking to the bland palate of a seasoned warrior.

He wolfs his breakfast down while he and Desmond spontaneously attend an ongoing combat between a gap-toothed blacksmith’s apprentice and a stonemason’s son, both younglings barely below Malik’s age, both in good fettle.

They spectate, leaned on the bordering fence of the sparring ring, Altaïr silent and engaged by food and Desmond sporadically commenting on the combatants’ skills, until a winner is declared, by which time Altaïr has long finished his meal and they’re ready to resume their original route.

It’s at the end of the corridor, Desmond reminds him when they enter the correct corridor and Altaïr recalls the map. Inside, they are forsaken by the daylight streaming through the oculus crowning Barzel’s colossal statue and embraced instead by the pools of misty, yellow light cast by the floating narrowly-spaced lanterns guarding each shopfront.

Among the row of shops to his right, Altaïr catches a glimpse of one selling a menagerie of ornaments and bauble, and among those an assortment of big, small, bright, dark, downy, bristly—feathers. He remembers Malik’s feather collection and considers picking up a feather for him, maybe two, or three, or bringing him so many that he finds himself surfeited with feathers.

Altaïr almost makes an off-the-cuff foray into the shop when something else draws his full attention.

A horde of submen—at least two faces familiar to him—suddenly marches past them almost knocking down people on their way out of the corridor, looking as though only orders are keeping them from looting wares, burning shops, killing innocents. Al Mualim’s men. Mercenaries. Foreigners. Murderers.

Freely advertising their presence to the city.

Altaïr and Desmond exchange a wordless, meaningful look before Desmond takes him by the arm and carts him off to the last shop in row. Rauf’s Forge.

The inside is hotter than the corridor, there is an inferno flashing inside the smoldering furnace.

Altaïr can’t help but notice it first.

It’s something quite beautiful and terrifying and unlike any fire forge he’d seen before.

[The forge](http://theartoftheroom.com/wp-content/uploads/2013/10/IMG_00023.jpg) is clearly an evocation of Barzel, the goddess of fire that this swordsmith has chosen for his patron, it’s an overscaled mold cast in the form of her gaping mouth that opens wide around the fire and lends the rest of the shop the diminutive impression of being tiny in comparison to this gargantuan piece of art honoring the goddess. Her eyes are large and fiery, her mouth looks as if it’s about to swallow the massive anvil resting a step ahead of it, the inside of her behemoth mouth flashes like enormous snakes of fire, the beauty of her curly plaits twisting outwards like clambering vines looks almost incongruous with her overall frightening appearance.

A lantern glows at the back of the room among the many smith tools and other sundry gadgets but compared to the flare of the furnace, it’s nothing but a dark puddle too weak to compete.

The air is sweltering and stuffy, a draft of cold air is a luxury.

As soon as they enter they are glared at by the customer before them.

The swordsmith is nowhere in sight.

“What a pleasant surprise meeting _you_ here,” Abbas drawls drolly. He wears the same pricey robes that were bestowed upon him by Al Mualim, or some other benefactor.

“Charmed,” Desmond quips, with a caustic tone that is the habitual consort to Abbas’ presence. A tone invented, perhaps, specifically for Abbas.

“Is that uncouth band of animals we just met of your ilk? Seeing how you were never of _our_ ilk to begin with,” Desmond taunts.

“Are you sure they are the animals and not your precious warriors? Can’t see much difference these days.”

“Certain sure,” Desmond says, but it pains him to do so. He’s seen what’s becoming of people he once called brothers- and sisters-in-arms, how they stalk the city aimlessly unaware that they no longer exist, “If you keep hanging around with the no-good folks, you’ll get in a heap of trouble for certain sure.”

Abbas suddenly turns to face them head-on and they await trouble.

“When did you ever greet me short of mockery?” Abbas asks in disturbing honesty, and it’s nothing they’ve expected. They fall silent. Both know that Abbas speaks of the bulk of warriors that used to be stationed with him years ago, before the war, before the Massacre.

Altaïr’s mouth, which up until now has been sporting a smirk as garnish for Desmond’s taunts, flattens into something blank and stunned. At his right, Desmond’s brows are folding in a flurry of confusion, then anger.

“You received what you deserved, you fucking clod.”

“Why?” Abbas spits and, despite the trade of unwavering and mutual dislike, this is the most honest they have been in many years. Whatever temporary madness has seized Abbas hops onto Desmond and Altaïr like a lump of gloating coal suddenly igniting them.

“Well if your cowardice and dishonor aren’t enough: you’d steal a wooden leg off a cripple if it benefited you,” Desmond jibes.

“At least I was one of you. Unlike the ‘uncouth band of animals’.”

“You were a child-murdering coward—“ Altaïr starts.

“ _Everyone_ was killing children that night!” Abbas hisses and the revolting truth of this puts a cold blanket of silence over them. The truth, so unsightly and repulsive, lies there among the three of them naked, and no one wants to touch it at first.

Then, as though nothing has happened, Abbas gives them a withering glance, fixes his bearing into one of professional composure with hands clasped behind his back, and he is all that they’ve always despised. There’s absence of regret, other than that of being falsely identified as the only one who had killed children. Altaïr hasn’t. He knows Desmond hasn’t. Ezio never even participated in the Massacre, he mourned the death of his own family.

“We hate each other,” Abbas concludes succinctly, “but I preferred not to disobey my leader.”

He grins wickedly as if he’s grown very drunk on his own words and his hoggish eye glitters with enthusiasm. It is, somehow, profoundly disgusting to behold.

Altaïr wants to say that they don’t have a leader, but he knows they did. He thinks of Malik, a tear-stricken child shrieking over the fresh mound of his brother’s grave, and the sausage he has eaten wants to leave him.

“Abbas,” he starts, just to keep the rising bile in his throat disciplined, before the memory of Malik hurls him into another, and he remembers the threat he once left Abbas with, “My payment approaches. Where’s the coin you owe me?”

Before long Abbas’ smirk drops and his face adopts the expression of a strong-minded donkey. Altaïr can see in his eye that he’s uneasy about the subject of money.

“I’m having my new sword fashioned. Shall be another couple days. If I could carry the debt till then…?”

“We’ll settle the debt as it stands. Perhaps you could delay the manufacture of your own sword and pay for my own instead, for starters?”

Abbas grinds his jaw encouraging the muscle below his scarred eye to jitter in the blotchy light of the small lamp sitting atop the counter that divides the three of them from the rest of the forge. He looks as though he’s exhausted his reserve of excuses.

“Any other favor I could offer in lieu?” he asks and for all his ostentatious new clothing, he appears to be short on coin, “You could employ your young husband at a more elevated position? Or find appropriate work for yourself? I’ve connections, speak to see it done.“

“I have no words towards such end. I’ll see the agreement honored here and now—“

”I’ve given you and your sorry band my answer already!” comes an abrupt, booming voice, from a small room at the back of the shop, presumably from the man reputed to be the best swordsmith in the city.

“You’ll regret this!” Abbas shouts back hysterically and flecks of spittle discharge from his frothy mouth corrupting the parched, fashionably-cracked wood of the counter with his saliva. He pivots on heel and leaves them using this bizarre exchange as an excuse to divert himself from Altaïr’s presence.

Altaïr watches the last of him, launching into a colorful disarray of vile oaths insulting Abbas’ honor and raving about his cowardice as soon as the man swerves round the corner. He turns back to Desmond expecting to find at least an echo of his annoyance mirrored on Desmond’s face, but finds him staring at the ground, at nothing in particular, with a particular expression Altaïr has never seen on his face.

Desmond refuses to look at him and insists on keeping his mouth shut, until he’s piled up a small fortune of anger and has no more space to keep it in.

“Are you so different from him, Altaïr?”

Desmond‘s eyes dart up and his eyes are flashing and it has nothing to do with the lamp. Then, with a thump of such suddenness that for a moment Altaïr might have mistaken it for a knife, a pain stabs itself into the center of his chest bursting towards his throat.

He is at a loss of words until his throat unknots itself.

“Speak plainly.”

“You and Ezio. Weren’t you the same the other day? Standing aside like cowardly mice when they brought the corpses in?”

“Desmond—“

“I don’t want to hear it, Altaïr,” he butts in, his tone affronted, “I was the only one who did something. It wasn’t _me_ who stood idle while our priests were about to be dumped into the ocean. We were their children, Altaïr. We, the orphans.”

Desmond’s voice has begun to soften around the edges before he’s finished and it works as an equalizer, their pain is split between them and shared. Altaïr realizes, belatedly, that Desmond is no longer furious with him, but disappointed at the impassive resignation with which they reacted on the scene. Altaïr isn’t sure that he can shoulder the burden of Desmond’s disappointment with a greater ease than his anger.

Whatever he means to say in response dies on his tongue when they’re suddenly joined by someone else.

“They have been nagging me for days. For years I forge them weapons and it’s never enough…” that orotund voice booms through like a thunderclap as the swordsmith announces himself anew and Altaïr realizes how hushed his exchange with Desmond has been despite the volume of Desmond’s words.

The hooded figure heaves itself into view emerging from a room at the back of the shop.

The bottom half of his face is concealed behind a mask, and Altaïr finds it somehow hard to believe that its sole purpose is protection from fire.

He appears well-groomed and fit, a square-shouldered man whose tunic looks too slack for his impressive torso.

As he approaches them at the counter he is drawing up the sleeves of his tunic across his bronzed, hairy arms. Altaïr’s gaze momentarily drops to the frazed hems of sleeves scorched by fire, then up, over the teeth-white tunic open at the throat, dappled with stains and a very black rake-through of coal residue streaking down the front, and up to where the slack lace of his collar is undone and barely keeping his neckline belted, as though he’s just slipped his tunic back on.

He keeps a thin cord around his neck like a necklace, with a small drawstring bag dangling at its end. The drawstring is loose and Altaïr catches a glimpse of grainy sand caught in an endless tumble and hissing inside.

He has, doubtlessly, just finished praying to [Hiba](http://the-king-of-novices.tumblr.com/post/105028879746/live-forever-or-die-trying-the-pantheon-310).

It’s curious for such a toughened man to worship such a meek god. Altaïr has only recently rediscovered this household deity, but this man must be an avid worshipper in comparison to him.

“Hiba’s blessings upon you, friend, “he salutes Desmond with a smile that manages to remain shiny even while hidden from view.

“And you, Rauf.”

They greet one other with a fond clasp of fists and a trade of smiles. They seem very thick with each other. This appears to be the reason why Rauf hooks a finger into the gap between the bridge of his nose and his cheek to pull down the mask shirring the fabric below his chin to reveal his finely-shaped dark face and the beard framing a full, smiling mouth.

Rauf is a sharp-featured man, with that slight shading on the cheeks that marks those unfortunate men who have to shave their jaw twice a day, though without a trace of that dull unhealthy tinge it so often has on men with paler skin. His eyebrows are dense and there is something topiary about them, his eyes steely-gray—a cold color.

“They still bother you?”

“They’re growing bolder. I’ve been,” Rauf starts off, flashing his splayed, callus-ridden palm, “arguing, ignoring, fighting, cursing them.” He looks at the thumb which has been left uncounted. “I even asked to be relieved of duty due to advanced age. But then I remembered I’m not old enough for that.”

With that last amusing addition, the jocose man solders his fingers into a fist and drops it in sync with the soar of his mouth into a roguish smile.

Altaïr understands why Al Mualim would want the services of a self-made man who rose to a high and secure position in this trade.

“Me and my friend here are already relieved of office,” says Desmond with a flick of his head towards Altaïr.

“I’ve heard.”

They don’t ask how he knows of the disbandment.

“Speaking of which,” Desmond surprises Altaïr’s shoulder with a doting clap and it feels as though no quarrel has transpired between them earlier, “This is your new customer. We’re in dire need of swords.”

“Rauf,” the blacksmith introduces himself stretching out his hand. To Altaïr’s astonishment, Rauf seizes him warmly and his hand is searing hot, as if he’s just pulled it from a fire, and Altaïr is sure that the man hasn’t even approached the furnace.

Altaïr shakes it and names himself too.

Rauf’s eyebrows unexpectedly gather into a puckered frown.

“Altaïr? The husband of Malik?”

“Yes. I do call him husband.”

Rauf screws down the ends of his lips in grave regard. For a moment, his steely eyes turn hard as whetstones as he surveys Altaïr and something cold and slimy twists itself into Altaïr’s gut.

“Tell your husband I’m saddened that his skillful hand hasn’t touched my sword in a long time,“ Rauf says after a ruminant pause.

He winks; his mustache bristles.

Altaïr’s belly flips inward on itself.

There’s pain in the way his heart seems to rise to thud at the base of his throat. He should respond; instead he just feels faintly sick. He stares, dumbly, while a queasy dread keeps fermenting in his chest, while the wheels shift slowly through the mist of his mind, and his eyes widen in sudden realization. A wisdom on whose summit is not enlightenment, but abyss.

It’s a realization that intrudes so roughly upon his most intimate dream—a young man’s chronic longing for loyalty—a dream forced into a state of siege before it’s finally shattered by dozens of small trifles Altaïr has been trying to ignore that suddenly grow to a bewildering size—so bewildering that it’s hard to ignore the mounting sense of terror that Malik is, or has been, unfaithful to him.

That this man is his lover.

Altaïr stares at him completely addled and somehow can’t believe and accept that his own absolute fidelity to Malik has not been reciprocated.

There’s a gap in conversation now.

Rauf is smirking, with a sly cast to his face. It hasn’t taken him two moments to rub it into Altaïr that Malik, in fact, has a lover.

Altaïr’s mind vacates him for a moment, replaced with a dull feeling, a surge of savagery in heart, a chill that passes over him as he thinks about the dark eyes of his husband clouded by lust for someone else.

His breath is heaving, he stares at the place Rauf occupies. His fists unclench at his sides, though he hasn’t been aware he’d clenched them. His lips curve in a loathsome snarl—he reaches for his hip blindly, impulsively, for the sword he no longer possesses, and, met with the void, he solders his hand into a knuckle-white fist ready for use.

He says nothing. He looks as if he wants to punch Rauf.

Desmond’s hand clamps down on his wrist to smother his fury.

“Altaïr—“ he starts and doesn’t reach past his name. Altaïr’s free hand rockets up slamming the center of Desmond’s chest with a dull thud and he stumbles backwards, confounded.

“Fuck you!” he barks at him in the most wounded howl, swerving to Rauf while Desmond is still staggering into balance, the thin veneer of his composure dissolved entirely as his arm shoots across the counter suddenly seizing the blacksmith by the string of his sand bag.

”And fuck _you_!“ he yanks, jerking him forward as his punch-arm recoils tautly like a plucked bow and he catapults it quite mercilessly at Rauf’s face without letting a drop of his fury go waste.

The crunch of Rauf’s mangled nose doesn’t satisfy him as much as he would have wanted, the ensuing grunt of shock-and-pain when the blacksmith staggers sideways from the vengeful might of his punch does little to mend the open sore in his chest.

“ _Fuck_ your mother,” Altaïr hollers with a grief-twisted mouth and a film of tears dimming his wild, unblinking eyes, “ _Fuck_ the weapons, and _fuck_ your sword!”

Altaïr spins around, launches through the exit, sprints down the corridor, bound for home.

 

* * *

 

 

He doesn’t pause for a breath and where an ordinary man would have utterly worn himself out Altaïr forges ahead fueled by righteous fury.

_His skillful hand hasn’t touched my sword in a long time._

Each word of this insinuation drops like heavy stone on his skull. Even though he gallops ahead scaling the hill like an unridden stallion, he feels like lead is poured into his gut with each step he puffs uphill.

He is half-way through the hell by the time he makes it through the door of his home.

Malik is bathing when Altaïr barges inside.

He looks up startled by the jittery clap of wood as Altaïr thunders through propelling the door against the wall.

A pitcher dangles off Malik’s hand limply, an influx of warm water streaming over its wide notch as he gapes at the warrior.

Altaïr lumbers through, stomping across the clean carpet as if it were no costlier than ashes, darkly flushed, wild-eyed, and Malik is shocked to see that his face is a mess of unwiped tears. He stands there exhibiting himself to Malik’s stare for a split second, he is panting through clenched teeth like a distraught beast, powerful chest expanding with heaving breaths, anguish etched into his face.

Malik would like to admit that in this very moment he doesn’t know fear, but it would leave a smear on his self-honesty. Altaïr looks every bit the monster Malik thought him to be when he arrived.

Malik’s bathing equipment is neatly laid out across the table; Altaïr sees himself surrounded by an assortment of different vials and bowls, pitchers and amphorae. He slams his fists on the table irrelevantly of where they’ll land, the pottery rattles like scattered jewelry. The first few vials that fall victim to his indiscriminating choice he sends flying towards the wall ahead, smashing them into pieces. The rest he sweeps off the table with a wild swing of an arm hurling the items to floor—carpet and stone alike.

He swears vilely spitting profanities and ire but not a word of it is audible to Malik, drowned as it is by the din of oaths, shatter of dyed glass, clatter of metal trays, thudding of uncapped ceramics across floor **–** all tangled in a net of noise.

“What seized _your brains_ , man!?“ Malik yells out, it’s not the tone he’s been striving for but the savagery of Altaïr’s antics has rooted him to the spot, in the midst of the tub where he feels caged.

Altaïr whirs around, he is shivering fury.

“ _I thought you were without touch of men_!”

Malik stares back in stunned disbelief with the same mystified, awe-struck expression, his mouth moving stupidly and soundlessly.

Altaïr’s antics are born of a clear mind and a wounded heart, an infantile hurt of pride.

“Did you not hear what I said?!” he snaps when Malik says nothing, “Find your tongue!”

“You’re not making any sense… What slight has prompted this costly eruption, dimwit!?”

“You weren’t faithful to me!” Altaïr roars, teary-eyed, bringing the shouting match to a temporary stalemate.

The shock of this accusation leaves Malik baffled enough to render speech impossible. Words need space and breath is lodged in his throat.

Altaïr seizes this pause.

“You have once _sworn_ to me!“

“An oath that hasn’t wavered—“

Altaïr cuts him off with another growl, ramming the heels of his palms against the side of the tabletop. The table topples over; the jarring clap of heavy wood against stone joins the commotion and the warrior roars whipping up rage into his every movement.

“ _You have a lover_!” he shouts, his voice thick with emotion. There’s too much emotion in him. Malik feels Altaïr might open his throat with bare teeth.

“Who!?”

“ _Rauf_!” Altaïr spits the name out like poison, an acid bubble of bile rising from his stomach into his throat.

Malik’s face falls. Altaïr takes a step closer.

“Do you deny it?“ Altaïr’s lips wrap themselves around the question until it distorts his mouth into something anguished and _betrayed_.

“Only _you_ could be as stupid as to destroy your own property over that—!“

“Do you _deny_ it?“

“I deny it.“

“Lier.“

“I’m _not_ lying,“ Malik hisses passionately but he recovers swiftly, arranging his features into a mask of perfect poise, “You think you know everything, don’t you? So you come here to balm your wounded pride by beating me, is that it?” he mocks in a stroke of sarcasm.

He’s baiting the monster out of him. Altaïr is advancing towards the bathtub, they’re face to face now, and something will happen.

Malik juts his chin out, eyes narrowed in more than mere bravado. Altaïr doesn’t know it but it’s the face of someone assured in their victory.

“Rauf is my sword instructor,” he speaks when a whisper is enough to bridge a gap between them, frosty and deliberate.

Altaïr’s anger flattens and everything falls eerily calm.

He blinks through stale tears and stands rooted to the spot before Malik’s tub, his heart a tight cocooned pupa of relief, his face the aftermath of a nonsensical war that has taken place there.

His judgment has clearly been way too harsh.

Malik shakes his head at his barren, dumbfounded face, mourning the demolition of his property.

“Sometimes I feel like you’ve replaced your brains with muscles,” Malik mutters assessing the damage Altaïr has left in the wake of his irrational anger, the vials and bowls he has collected over the years lying in shambles across the room, the cosmetics and oils he’s been storing meticulously soaking into the prized carpet that his months of hard work have financed.

Altaïr keeps on staring completely oblivious to the insult, his chest bursting with the unreleased sigh of relief. Then, suddenly, while Malik is reaching for his towel to see himself out of the tepid bathtub, Altaïr speaks up.

“ _Sword_ instructor?” he wonders incredulously, “You know how to hold a sword…?”

Malik drops the towel in mid-grab and recoils as though singed by Altaïr’s words. His jaw unhinges and his mouth falls open in the most offended expression, he bristles at the suggestion of incompetence.

Neither of them sees it coming, but Malik’s palm connects with Altaïr’s cheek reflexively, driven by the goading of pride he has criticized Altaïr for only moments before.

Altaïr’s face veers sideward from the impact, barely masking the slap with the broken sound of astonishment.

The smack that will insist buzzing in Altaïr’s ear for hours later is wet, blistering, brain-rattling, painful.

Altaïr has never been slapped as violently as this before. The smack has been by far the loudest of all the sounds that had ricocheted round this room since Altaïr’s return.

Malik’s hand stings hotly. A wave of indignation ripples across his face and anger flares in his chest, mixed with the desire to grab a hold of Altaïr’s head and slam the unhinged door into his handsome face until he’s nothing but blood on wooden planks.

Little by little, Altaïr turns to look at him and Malik welcomes his face with the proximity of his own, their noses nearly grazing each other.

“After I’m done with you, you’ll have a question to answer, _warrior_ ,” Malik jeers through clenched teeth and Altaïr can smell the fiery resentment on his breath.

“Yeah?”

“Yeah. Tell me how my ass tastes.”

 

* * *

 

 

Ezio lays [the bowl](http://i00.i.aliimg.com/photo/v0/111860250/mother_of_pearl_bowl_crafts_indonesia.jpg) out across the first (and only) vacant surface that he stumbles upon in Leonardo’s studio.

Leonardo cocks his head, surveying Ezio’s gift. The vessel doesn’t look appealing in its shapeless wrapping. He disrobes it and it reveals its handsome shape.

”How _exciting_ ,“ he fingers along the rutted silver facing that winds round the rim of the bowl, until he closes the full circle and dips the pad of his finger inside to fondle the shimmering interior and feel the glossy tiles of the shell mosaic. The silver is decorated with foliaceous reliefs—leaves, vines, flowers twining volubly along the rim.

Leonardo recognizes the craft. It’s without a doubt made by the same artist who created the mother-of-pearl bowls Leonardo had admired at the market. The fact that Ezio has tracked down the merchant’s daughter, the artist itself, is less ludicrous than the fact that he’s paid a high price for it only to give it away as a gift.

“It’s an honor. Even greater honor receiving such a gift from a noble.”

“The title alone shouldn’t lend me any advantage. It’s unfair. We’re no different.”

To this grumbling Leonardo responds.

He laughs and it’s not a laugh of humor unblemished by reprimand, but Ezio can’t bring himself to care about its motives when it sounds so pleasant to his ears.

“Your ancestry fought for justice. Ours was only the product of love.”

“’Only’ doesn’t do it justice,” Ezio argues, dispassionately, and he’s ready to relinquish the subject. It’s neither the time nor place for it, it’s not what he’s come for, and he’s not wont of delving into details of why he admires the commoners more than his own kind. Besides, there has always been a touch of self-depreciation among the commoners that Ezio never appreciated and he doesn’t like its smell on this man.

He’d rather tuck himself into the herby scent that seems to religiously follow Leonardo everywhere, which he does as he watches the man storing his gift.

This inevitably leads him to a quick lookover of the room and he finds it a different yet same kind of chaos as last time.

Leonardo’s studio. A work and living place. A large room hastily furnished with odds and ends from many places—some of which function in ways Ezio barely understands—all of which form the common chaos that marks those unique kinds of rooms where everything fits so perfectly in a special anarchy of things. A high shelf groping the recess of a wall and struggling to store all the herbs that fight for space. A collection of books Leonardo has amassed quietly chuted into a remote stack. A white-robed chaise suffocating in patted cushions, stealing space from a table. Three tables, all overspilling with content—the unfinished quilt folded over a table, four pairs of some man’s new breeches splayed across another, a disarray of sewing tools sharing space with a half-raided bowl of dried figs and a small muslin bag of sweets.

The room is curiously personal, it has a pulse.

“So you like it?” he asks, so as to set the ball rolling.

“’Like’ doesn’t do it justice,” Leonardo mimics, “I’ve been needing a new bowl for poultices and salves, too.”

Ezio’s face creases into a contemplative frown. What an odd way to utilize a vessel of such ornamental beauty. A bowl for the ointments of an unregistered healer. It somehow is distinctly Leonardo, and Ezio admires it. Most of the things that Leonardo does or the pastimes he pursues are done out of genuine passion, not desire to grow rich.

When Leonardo comes to stand in front of him, they’re a step apart, Leonardo’s arms are crossed, and his mouth is carefully, deliberately, shamelessly drawn into a suggestive smile.

“Why do you continue so brazenly to press for my favor?”

Ezio shrugs a shrug completely barren of innocence.

“I’m a warrior freshly out of war. I need company…” he trails off and shortens the tremendous stretch of distance between them by edging forward, until the gap is halved and he can almost touch the jut of Leonardo’s crossed arms.

“You think you can buy yourself into someone’s bed?” His voice is low, the amusement on his face loud.

“I seize means available to me. Since my words seem to repeatedly fall on deaf ears.” Emboldened by Leonardo’s lightheartedness, Ezio reaches up. Long wisps of blond hair trail along the back of his hand as he traces up the column of Leonardo’s neck in a caress, as he retreats—just enough to allow his fingertips to catch along the back of his ear, gently, as if to use this convenient barrier to remain there and outline the earlobe with the pad of his thumb.

Ezio delays the retreat and lingers there, not lasciviously. Small though it is, it almost feels as if this caress isn’t a plain advance on him, but an attempt to tell him most interesting, most exciting things through this simple touch.

Leonardo’s face remains impassive, discouragingly solemn. Unmoved by whatever Ezio’s touch is whispering into his ear. Ezio loiters for another moment, hopeful, but then, stumped by the feeble reception of his flirt, he withdraws letting his arm tumble pendulously to his side.

“You may continue what you’ve started,” Leonardo tells him, in a way that barely helps Ezio recognize where they stand with each other.

“For a moment there I thought you despised my attentions.”

“Need I scream to let you know I enjoy it?” Leonardo cracks a mischievous smile and it lifts the warrior’s spirits instantaneously.

“No, you need not. But you’re hard to read, at times.”

Leonardo uncrosses his arms and Ezio expects something. His expectations plummet when the man walks past him, then soar when Leonardo shirrs the quilt-in-making aside across the table and hops onto it, seating himself across the edge.

His legs spread, invitingly but not inappropriately, and he pats against his inner thigh as a tacit prompt for Ezio to draw nearer.

“How’s that for hard?”

The soft curve of his smiling cheek and the upward dart of his fair eyebrow propel Ezio ahead, between Leonardo’s legs, where he feels he belongs. There’s a gleam in Leonardo’s expressive blue eyes and a gleam on his lips. They welcome Ezio as he settles in, plucking Leonardo by the waist to press the man snug to his belly.

Ezio had been close to many lovers, but never quite this tight, never this welded to another’s body while he sought their lips. He’s never been this untactful and impatient either, or eager in the way he glues himself to Leonardo’s body. (Maybe it’s the war that made him hungrier.) He saves his graces not through any action of his own, but by dint of Leonardo being poor in patience as well.

When he leans in, Leonardo opens up to him at once.

It’s unwise. Deeply unwise. Leonardo knows what Ezio wants just as much as Ezio knows what he wants and Leonardo hopes he won’t regret giving it to Ezio.

Leonardo had kissed many times, but it’s the first time to be kissed in a way that is setting him slightly off-balance. The first time they meet there’s something sweet, something soft, something lazy in their thorough kiss. They part and he flattens the pad of his thumb to Ezio’s firm, soft lips and wants to gorge himself on their ensuing kiss. It’s all greed for more, thinly separated from abandon and oddly combined with restraint, before it turns into something rougher, something mindless, all teeth, tongue, shallow breaths.

He feels the heat shifting from Ezio’s body to his, he feels the press of Ezio’s hard chest with every labored breath, he feels Ezio’s fingers tugging at the folds of his tunic while he paws at Ezio’s exposed back where the warrior’s tunic has slipped from belt and allowed Leonardo _up_.

“No,” he breathes against Ezio’s wet mouth, swats his hands off his own lower back.

“That’s unfair.” Ezio grins into their next kiss and proceeds to wander across Leonardo’s clothed back instead, barely upset by this injustice.

“Bear with it,” Leonardo teases, even as he tugs Ezio’s belt down and works himself up the warrior’s tunic, pressing palms-splayed across his bare back. It’s all warm skin pulled taut over firm muscle rippling beneath his flattening press.

Ezio is willing to allow him this head start until Leonardo acquaints himself with his body. A time beyond which he will find ways to cozy up and worm himself up the tunic he currently strokes in blind, futile search for skin contact.

He gives this plan ample bloom, and then, suddenly, when he realizes that Leonardo is pressing into his back with a sort of clinical interest, he terminates their join of lips to stare questioningly into the man’s face.

“You’ve wonderful muscle proportions.”

“What...?” Ezio blurts unintelligently.

“Do you mind if I make a sketch? I’m somewhat fascinated by the human anatomy, shapes of muscles and such…” Leonardo trails off, feeling cheerful and talkative all of a sudden as he hops off the table to fetch paper and charcoal from yet another overstuffed shelf.

Ezio stands dumbfounded, torn between disappointment at the loss of Leonardo’s attention and appreciation of Leonardo’s endearing behavior, volatile and innocently eager as it is.

“I don’t mind, but now’s not the time for such things,” he finds his voice, his resolve along with it.

He strides over in hasty steps, embraces Leonardo from behind before the man manages to produce the materials, “It can wait.”

“Oh? But this can wait as well, can it not?” Leonardo feigns innocence, cocking his head, allowing Ezio’s chin to settle into offered space.

“No. No, _this_ can’t wait,” he counters firmly. A moment, and then noses against the neckline of Leonardo’s tunic to replace his chin with his mouth and press into the skin that he’s liberated.

Leonardo replies with a lopsided grin. Soundless and bright, amused by Ezio’s persistence.

He gives in long before he asks the question.

“What is it you wish for?”

“The whisper of my name on your lips. Its taste on your lips,” Ezio says bluntly and pleads covertly, but not covertly enough to hide it; he’s open for reading.

Leonardo is aware that he’s come with more than mere flirt in mind.

On some level, Leonardo feels he’s selling himself for a pretty shell-bowl, but on another he feels he’s been deliberately delaying what both of them wanted from the start. It’s not an issue of modesty either. Leonardo isn’t one to deny himself pleasure when presented with opportunity. It’s fear, of winding up wanting more than just sex from Ezio. A warrior unlike Malik’s Altaïr. Unhinged in ways Altaïr isn’t, unburdened by ties of a deeper bond, bereft of desire to tangle himself into more than a few bouts of pleasure. In short, Ezio is a libertine, and Leonardo, at this point, is a seeker. And with this man, to seek more is to lose more.

This is the worry that nags at him even as he pivots within Ezio’s arms, even as Ezio groans against his lips, even as he claims the warrior’s mouth in a possessive, greedy, selfish way.

“I will give you this. And whatever else you persuade me to give you,” he says quietly, his whisper rasping with thoughtless arousal.

For once he’s thoughtless before Ezio. He’ll allow himself this luxury.

Ezio may learn to care for him, as a friend, and more than that. But he will resist being tied down. Even Altaïr had told him as much.

So he cleans himself of expectations before he sells himself; he seizes Ezio by the arm and hauls him off towards the chaise, pushes him among the pillows. Leonardo chases him for the space. It’s not what Ezio expects, but Leonardo slots himself between his legs, kneeling, hovering over the warrior when he arrests him by the hair, pulling at the root of Ezio’s ponytail until the ribbon surrenders to him and falls off in time with his tipping Ezio’s head back until he’s completely on offer for Leonardo’s mouth.

He pins Ezio’s head to a pillow below, smothers him with the kiss and Ezio allows this, _craves_ this, until the action is taken in turns by his brain, the flesh, the lungs. Until he’s drowning with want and rutting up into nothing, begging for touch that Leonardo gives freely.

There’s a wet hiss, an oath, a groan when he frees Ezio’s engorged cock without a qualm, welcomes the shaft into a steady hold without a blink of hesitation.

Leonardo will give him only this today, though he pines for more of this man. It’s not a triumph, but it’s a win by omission of complete weakness. The tunic he delivers from the belt’s grasp and lifts up for his own viewing pleasure, sweetened by the sight of nipples—dusky, perked up long before he’s revealed Ezio’s chest.

Ezio surrenders himself to the firm stroke of his hand and Leonardo surrenders himself to hunger for a sample of this man; he bends, his grip on the warrior’s cock unremitting, flicks his tongue across a pectoral, and Ezio positively _arches_ into his mouth with a moan-torn breath and it’s baffling, it’s delightful.

He smells of salt and sand, of sea, his breathy pants crush against Leonardo’s ears like waves lashing at the shore, it’s odd. He’s the sea itself, and Leonardo is drowning, and it feels sublime.

His chest, bronzed and powerful, rises with breaths like the tide and Leonardo rides on its waves kissing along his chest, across a pebbled nipple, mashing it between tongue and lips in a determined sort of pressure—an appreciated attention affixed by Ezio’s clawing at his nape with a clumsy fistful of blond hair while Leonardo feverishly picks up the pace of strokes.

“Leonardo—“ he stammers out, caught in the midst of a warning.

“Please let me, Ezio.”

Leonardo has stripped himself of patience he’s so known for. He doesn’t want to drag it out. There’s a seasoned warrior, putty in his arms and panting through kiss-bitten lips, and he wants him to yield and show just how little Leonardo needs to make him come.

Ezio tips his head back, groaning. Perspiration is rising along his throat, beading along his temples. He’s stiffly clutching the handful of blond hair he’s captured and thrusting into Leonardo’s working fist when the man coaxes the first spurts of seed out of him. Revealing his chest proves a convenient eschewal of a mess Ezio would have to deal with later.

He is sufficiently pacified after the first climax and he’s mellowed and receptive to caress devoid of lust.

It's what Leonardo will take for himself today; a brush of a thumb against his sweat-slicked collarbone, a whisper of a touch trailed up his side, a combing brush through his loose hair, a nestling press of nose against his neck. It’s what Leonardo hasn’t had in a long time. It’s what he might not have with this man in the future.

And when Ezio gears up again and his sex stirs with restored arousal, Leonardo has taken enough to sate himself.

Ezio has also understood his role in this and he’s contented enough—he’s used to being more active and involved in sex—but here-and-now is for Leonardo alone to orchestrate because the man won’t have it any other way.

Ezio’s is to ask and to take what’s given, and he asks for attention with another thrust of his hips, and he longs for lips on his own, and Leonardo gives him all of this, and more.

When the studio door opens neither of them cares to notice.

When the intruder finally notices them—her guardian and teacher pampering a very naked warrior on their chaise—she’s far too deep into the territory of the studio to escape by the same route unseen.

Salai gapes for another moment, eyebrows up, eyes roaming, momentarily at a terrible loss as to why she came in here in the first place. When she remembers, the task proves too risky—the couple coins she came to snag from Leonardo’s purse isn’t worth the jingle of metal that will distract the pair—so she slips away into the backroom to crawl out of the window, thankful that their abode is on the first ring-floor.

Down she goes, landing expertly below the window, bent on running around to lock the studio from outside and fend off customers for time being. It’s been a while since Leonardo had a decent man in his bed and she’ll be damned if she allows clients to disturb whatever arrangement Leonardo is having at the moment.

She promptly rejoins the main, sloped road, turns left, then left again, through the tunnel where someone almost crashes into her back.

“Whoa!“ Desmond puffs and sidesteps deftly to avoid colliding into her inside the tunnel.

He’s wheezing from the chase after Altaïr who has ran ahead like possessed, and as they exit the passage together he has barely soothed his breath.

“You’re just in time to watch the spar,“ Salai tells him, only vaguely explaining the sight that greets Desmond inside.

In the courtyard, Altaïr and Malik are priming themselves for a sword spar.

Desmond is at a loss as to how this development ensued. The weather itself seems to be in cahoots with this turnabout. Overhead the sky is a brilliant, cloud-less blue, not a trace of bloated grey clouds from earlier today. The windows upstairs are flung open where people are spectating from their homes. The ones outside have collapsed into the shade of alcoves at the perimeter of the courtyard and began to chatter loudly and excitably. A gaggle of children sits in a row along the bending fence of first floor-ring, their knobbly knees peeking between the tails of leisurely-withering hanging ferns where they’ve stuck their legs through gaps of the fence; they’re battling ardently with the clutch of elderly women sitting in an alcove below who bristle at their sitting on bare, chilly stone.

On the courtyard table, a score or more people have gathered, placing bets.

In their midst is Claudia. It’s an enthralling sight to watch her as she stands on the bench surveying the bettors and counting their wagers, knuckles on hips, dressed in the blackest cloak and brightest smile while the pile of coins on the table continues to grow.

“Anyone else for the warrior?” she calls propelling Desmond forward, “Just in time, Desmond,” she smiles as he extracts a handful of coins from his purse holding it up for her to count. She shrinks the wide stride of her stance to produce sitting space for him on the crowded bench and he seats himself into the gap.

“Anyone for Malik?”

There are a few chuckles and nothing besides.

Mary, seated at Claudia’s other side, smacks a big, fat matbea onto the table making the pile of coins wagered on Altaïr’s victory erode with a jingle from the shock of the impact and Desmond thinks the woman has gone insane risking such a big sum because of foolish favoritism for Malik.

“I would lay my coin towards my kid’s victory,” she announces proudly.

Claudia bends backwards dropping a coin of her own right atop Mary’s—the second of only two coins wagered on Malik’s victory.

“Well then,” Claudia drops to ground to sit back into the remaining gap rubbing shoulders with Mary and Desmond. Desmond commends her spontaneous entrepreneurship, but the odds lay at least a 100 to 1 against Malik. He looks around and reconnoiters the many faces watching the spar. Most seem to be sympathizing with Malik but sure that Altaïr will win.

“A fool’s wager,” he tells Claudia, emboldened by the spectators’ belief in Altaïr.

“Happily received,” she grins at him as if clinched business somehow makes her happier than winning the bet.

“You’re an old betting veteran, I expected better from you,” he jibes looking around for his other comrade, “Where’s Ezio?”

“Probably getting some from Leonardo.”

“Confirmed,” Salai reports from the spot she squeezed herself in, beside Mary.

Desmond whistles.

Ahead, in the clearing between the bustling table and the massive tree trunk shielding the vegetable garden, Malik and Altaïr are already circling each other like vultures over a carcass. Even the child swing is rolled up and neatly tucked atop the tree branch and everything cleared away for their convenience.

Altaïr eyes his husband as they slither across rutty cobblestone and feels the ghost of Malik’s slap on his cheek. He tests his jaw to ease the throb off his cheek, then smirks.

Malik is less strong than his proudly puffed-out chest might imply, but he glares daggers and his face is dyed in a cold anger—strong but controlled. He holds a sword of amazing lightness and temper. As he readies himself for an attack, the angle of his blade invites the sun, setting its surface ablaze for the fraction of a moment.

It’s a stunning sword. Fashioned by Rauf. A work of art Malik’s been hiding from him since his return. More than mere tool. Its handle gilded and carved into strange curlicue shapes, its knuckle-guard curved backwards atop Malik’s hand protectively. The blade is black. Dark like [Nokem](http://the-king-of-novices.tumblr.com/post/104486337526/live-forever-or-die-trying-the-pantheon-110)’s skin. It’s inlaid with Malik’s personal prayer that spans the length of the blade, embossed in golden calligraphy.

 _Father, make atonement with this blood_ , it reads on one side of the blade.

 _Give me your boldness to slay the enemy_ , on the other.

Altaïr understands why Malik has hidden it from sight. He has no doubts whose blood it is this sword thirsts for, who _the enemy_ is. It’s the same man who used to be Altaïr’s leader, the one who confiscated his weapon.

Since he’s been forced to relinquish his armor, Altaïr has no sword of his own.

Mary has been kind enough to offer him hers. Her blade is mighty and the sword is balanced. Altaïr is sufficiently satisfied with its length. Malik’s sword is not as sharp as Mary’s but it has sacrificed its cutting ability for length, specialized itself as a thrusting weapon in lieu of feebler cuts. Though simpler in appearance compared to Malik’s, her sword could cut wood like melted butter and Altaïr isn’t comfortable using it against Malik.

Malik seems confident that no one will be seriously injured but Altaïr isn’t.

He approaches the spar cautiously, determined to keep his sword to himself and give Malik leeway, perhaps feign putting up a fight to spare Malik’s self-esteem. He’d rather allow himself abject humiliation than even charge at Malik, but somehow he’s sure that’s not what Malik wants, nothing he will appreciate.

Whatever theatrics he is about to pull is for the sake of Malik’s dignity, and Altaïr has no objections to a little show if that will earn him Malik’s good graces.

He doesn’t expect much. He’s never seen him fight and he’s struggling to see him as an opponent, and it’s a deep error.

Malik doesn’t wait for Altaïr to attack.

He bolts, streaking out so fast he’s nothing more than a blur. Altaïr is momentarily frozen in awe of his speed.

He’s ceaseless and unyielding in his first barrage of attacks, his eyes calculating and thoughtful. He’s a planner. He thinks before he fights and while he fights, solving riddles to lend his movements the perfect timing and perfect execution.

Altaïr quickly realizes: Malik is actually fighting him. And he’s expected to fight back.

The second time they go in at the same time. With a violent clash they launch at each other and all semblance of courtesy ebbs away. The disparity between their swords’ specialties is partially leveled by their varying skills and strengths.

Malik is inhumanly fast. Perhaps it’s the leanness of his body that lends him such speed. It’s Malik’s speed and technique against Altaïr’s strength and experience.

Altaïr can see him on the side, then he parries, and Malik has suddenly ducked, is almost at his back in the flash of a moment. His strikes are perfectly executed, none is half-hearted, his blade flashing, compensating with technique what he lacks in brute strength.

He has a way of swirling his wrist that extends into his blade in a manner that wards off most of potential close-range attacks, a swirl that’s born of great mastery combined with an innate suavity to his movements that makes it look like art.

Altaïr had trained himself chiefly to use his sword in battle; he’s unused to such a refined skill. But Altaïr blames it on his battle-honed instincts that he moves easily through the maze of Malik’s attacks.

At intervals sudden banging and yelling breaks out through the air, rambunctious shouts of mirth ring on all sides filling the courtyard in a simultaneous crash. Their blades retort with metallic clangs of steel.

Malik favors his uninjured leg. Altaïr attempts to target his extremities to disable him, but Malik is as quick in defense as he is in charge. He gives up on Malik’s legs, targeting his arms. His wrist vibrates in sync with his sword as Malik keeps blocking his attacks. Malik’s hand is encased in the knuckle-guard on the hilt, it gives him a confidence in defense; when he lunges he doesn’t fear throwing his hand out in front of him to attack, because Altaïr can’t hit it, because the guard is always in the way protecting his hand.

It’s only when Malik dares to expose the rest of his arm that Altaïr carves out a chink of space for a strike.

Malik thrusts out; Altaïr deflects, quicker than expected, leaving Malik’s arm extended for long enough a moment to take advantage of as he thrusts through, below Malik’s arm, slapping his underarm with the flat of his blade as a warning.

Altaïr pulls back, snags Malik’s sleeve with the tip of the blade. It’ll have to be stitched back.

It’s been a daring move—one wrong angle and he could have cut into Malik’s arm.

Malik growls, annoyed with his own slip-up, but his confidence doesn’t shrink.

He attacks boldly, to hasten victory.

He rains attacks on Altaïr.

Dodging, swiping, stabbing, lunging, until Altaïr is bleeding confusion. The warrior doesn’t usually get clobbered by someone smaller but he suddenly feels like a mouse wielding a stick against a god. There’s a whiff of temporary disorientation on him, a step of misbalance.

He feels porous and pregnable and Malik senses this.

The crowd at the table lets out a few preliminary hoots as the two of them keep inching towards the group, and then they scatter, promptly, fragmenting as they retreat with laughter and disjointed outcries of surprise-cheers- _excitement_.

Altaïr has no space to back away. He’s forced to fall into a sit once the cleared bench hits the back of his knees. The clashing of swords comes to a stop. All eyes are fixed on Altaïr’s hand when it shoots backwards clenching an apple from tabletop.

He pauses. Aims. Throws.

It thuds against Malik’s chest and people break into laughter.

Malik’s responds with a snarl, however aware that just because it’s a sword fight doesn’t mean they can’t punch, kick, grapple, throw things.

“You move well,” Altaïr tells him between laugh-tinted puffs of breath, “As if instruction has been bestowed upon you for a long time.”

“I said that Rauf is my teacher. The adulterer you wish to conjure up has been ever loyal to you.”

“And stationed far above his husband.”

The praise doesn’t sit well with Malik. His face itself arranges into something darker and he scowls at Altaïr who doesn’t bother to budge, sitting half-sprawled across bench and table.

“Get up.”

Another apple connects with Malik’s chest, drops to ground to join the first missile.

“Need a shield, husband?” Altaïr taunts.

Malik lunges at him; he barely escapes.

Malik launches into a chase leaving the table up for grabs and the exiled bystanders fall back into their old seats to spectate the unfolding pursuit. Compelled by dire circumstances, Altaïr has escaped sideways and their sparring ground is now shifting elsewhere, away from the clearing between the table and tree towards the clearing between the table and the shower-ring.

Malik has belatedly seen through Altaïr’s taunt as an attempted theft of time. The warrior is waiting for Malik’s adrenaline crush to kick in but it’s nowhere in sight.

Malik is livid and anger fuels his persistence.

Spiteful, he moves as though he’s already notched a win for himself. His face is split by feverish fury and his dark eyes ablaze. Excitement and exertion dye his cheek with blushes. If movements could speak every part of his body would whisper _kill_. It reminds Altaïr of the night he foiled Malik’s attempted assassination of Al Mualim.

It’s all Altaïr has come to love and nothing he had expected during the past seven years. He’d wanted a docile and doting husband, not a ferocious beast. He sidesteps old expectations as easy as he sidesteps Malik’s attacks, embraces the beauty that is his actual husband and not a made-up image of him.

He feels a sudden boiling of pleasure in chest, unlike relief. A wave of hopeless fatigue that suddenly douses his body, detaching him, almost, from reality, through a sensation not utterly unknown to wine. Malik’s fury intoxicates him.

He tarries, for the split moment while his top-heavy body keeps him in place, then falls back into the routine of defending himself against Malik’s persistent blows. Though he must continue fighting, he is more careless of his victory. It’s a question of moment when he will yield to Malik.

Clusters of cries tumble down on them from each side of the courtyard, Mary’s words ring loudest of all:

“Come on, Malik! Wipe the ground with his face, kid!”

It’s becoming more apparent that Altaïr has relinquished aspirations for victory.

Many faces at the table stand frozen, gaping at them in disbelief. Desmond turns sideways to gape at Claudia, similarly awe-struck.

”What?” she acknowledges his amazement bemusedly, and smiles the smile of a person who has known it would come to this.

“You cunning little… Teach me.”

She locks her arm round his neck pulling his face closer conspiratorially, “You think in terms of strength, Desmond. I think in terms of heart. See?” she points at where Altaïr is currently avoiding Malik’s attacks which he can’t parry, as though this would explain anything, “He doesn’t defer to Malik in order to _empower_ Malik, he defers so that he could feel _closer_ to Malik. He fights, alright, but not with a desire to win. Altaïr just wants to give himself to Malik. It’s almost a mating call of sorts, if you will.”

Desmond’s eyes flit dubiously between the last throes of the spar and her face, and somehow he can’t bring himself to question the accuracy of her thorough assessment. Not as he sits there gawping at Altaïr’s utterly unconvincing performance.

Not even as Altaïr attempts one of his last offensives, thrusting forward with doubts about the expediency of such a course in the present crisis and finding that he’s lunged at precisely the wrong moment and the swing of his sword is disappointingly softened by the blade of Malik’s weapon as Malik slaps it away with a timely parry.

Altaïr is done for, what he does can barely be called fighting. Malik dances past the swings of his heavy sword easily and his own widely-ranging moods are already hard to deal with. They range from relief to awe of his skill, then lust, and for one moment confusion picks a fight with him making him susceptible to Malik’s advance.

He’s winnowing through Malik’s movements trying to sort through what’s attack and what a ruse; he wavers. This hesitation is fatal.

Malik feels suddenly filled with a wild, reckless impulsiveness. His eyes are bright, his fingers itch. He attacks, thrusts his blade. Altaïr prepares himself for the lash of Malik’s sword, remains frozen in mid-parry as Malik pulls back instead and brings his swordless his hand sharply across Altaïr’s cheek in an excellent hook. It’s a stealthy punch that gives Altaïr no time to react.

He staggers backwards. Feels the mark burning hot on his jaw, hears the sharp intakes of breath from the table.

The roar of ensuing noise is deafened by the pounding of blood in his ears and having to deflect Malik’s next attack sends him a few steps backwards—a movement that Malik religiously follows by chasing after him.

They struggle. The showers are very close behind him now.

He continues to retreat, Malik continues his advance.

He attempts a swing.

Malik blocks it, then goes on with a chain of quick and disconnected attacks which Altaïr suspects are only a way to confuse him.

Altaïr tries again, lifts his sword. Malik drops his own, slotting it beneath Altaïr’s and thrusting _up_ , shoving the blade off into air and forcing Altaïr’s arm to follow this movement for the sake of keeping the sword in hand; it leaves his stomach and flank comically exposed.

Malik squares his leg up and _kicks_ —no qualms, no mercy.

Altaïr is catapulted backwards by the force of this impact.

There’s a dramatic splash of amazed distress on Altaïr’s face as he stumbles through the nearest gap between shower columns.

His feet forget that there’s a pair of stairs descending into the shower floor and he staggers backwards and lands across the tiles in a disgraceful heap of limbs with an _oomph_ of surprise.

It’s been a savvy move.

Followed by another as Malik launches at him with his whole body while Altaïr can barely process what’s happening, and when it comes he has neither the time nor desire to evade and he catches the whole of it—the entire weight of Malik torpedoing into him until his back slams against the damp floor and his vision grows spotted with specks of dark.

The next thing he feels is Malik pressing into him, pinning his chest down with the strength of his arm and the clench of his calves, he feels the heat of Malik’s body where his knees have clamped atop his collarbone, the cool touch of Malik’s sword pressing into his throat.

He blinks up, slowly, looking into Malik’s beautiful, sneering face. Malik’s chest is bursting with baited anticipation. This is his new husband, and he could drive a man insane with lust.

Altaïr draws the first breath.

He inches his hands overhead and away from his body, sword in hand, across the floor. The tip of Mary’s blade rasps against a tile as he puts his hands up in surrender.

Triumph is splitting Malik’s face with an eager grin.

“I yield,” Altaïr breathes throatily, “Do with me as you wish. I’m the slave of your whim.”

Malik feels a shiver of power sweeten his limbs, worm its way into his chest, and warmth seeps into his groin.

Altaïr isn’t sure if he’s imagined a glint of arousal flit across his husband’s face. Then it’s over. Malik quickly immures his genuine reaction to his words somewhere in the background of his ostensible triumph, and it does little to alleviate the toll that Malik’s proximity has taken on Altaïr’s body.

Altaïr is staring right into the mystified, red-cheeked, flushed amazement of Malik’s face when the young noble realizes that he’s made himself comfortable atop Altaïr’s erection.

He leaps to his feet, taking care not to look at Altaïr’s crotch directly.

“Get up,” he orders, his voice unreadable, “Follow me.”

Altaïr is on steady feet in a blink, poised and eager for instruction.

Malik heads right upstairs, home-bound, leaving the courtyard to repopulate itself without his particular presence. Altaïr obediently follows, like a dog tugged by the collar.

Half-way up it occurs to Altaïr that he should restore the sword to its rightful owner and the short detour back downstairs to return the weapon to Mary is enough to give Malik a considerable advantage. He vanishes inside their home long before Altaïr can manage to catch up with him.

He shoulders his way through the door, only to find himself yanked inside by the front of his tunic.

Then he is pushed against the door until it’s slammed shut with a force that makes the whole frame quiver. Malik is upon him in an instant, with shaky puffs of breath he can’t blame on exertion alone, and pupils blown until they’ve nearly conquered the surrounding darkness of his eyes.

“You’re at my whim, you said. You’ll do as I say, “Malik breathes into his face and Altaïr is temporarily nonplussed. Malik is propped on his toes to trim their height difference.

“Anything.”

“You’ll give me what you gave me last night,” he orders, “Should you have any terms you can reason them to my cock. “

Altaïr nods, deliberately, trying to take advantage of the slow bob of his head to move in for a kiss. It’s denied to him when Malik drops to his heels releasing Altaïr from the tenacious grip. By the time Altaïr finds his faculties Malik is waiting for him in the bedroom.

He finds him on their bed.

Malik’s already sitting there on his haunches, in the nude, and sporting an erection. Waiting.

Altaïr doesn’t collapse onto the neatly made mattress with Malik’s haste; he doesn’t even discard his own clothes. He seats himself on the very edge of the bed with one foot grazing the floor and the other leg bent to mimic Malik’s, but he keeps his hands to himself, until Malik is ravaged by impatience and taking hold of his wrist to guide his hand to where he wanted to be touched.

By pulling on him Malik inadvertently reduces the distance between their faces and Altaïr uses this fortunate development as a convenient excuse to seek out Malik’s neck.

“Your desires are well-noticed,“ he assures in whispers as he noses himself up along Malik’s neck and tightens his hold on the cock in hand, “And ours are well-matched.“

Malik glances then at the front of Altaïr’s breeches and Altaïr watches him suddenly grow bashful before his eyes, as if the notion of Altaïr’s body being subject to the same arousal hasn’t crossed Malik’s mind prior to those words.

Altaïr has picked up a handful of lessons about Malik and the most important of them is to never leave even a scintilla of room for Malik’s doubt to flourish. Where there’s doubt there’s regret, followed by self-denial. And so he releases Malik’s sex pushing at his chest until he tips over and falls against the mattress, then rolls him onto his stomach with the greatest ease, with nothing more than a resolute grab-and-pull on Malik’s waist.

“I believe you left me instructions before our spar.”

“What?” Malik stammers through the question as he pulls himself up onto elbows.

“’Tell me how my ass tastes’? Was that it?” Altaïr taunts, trying to recall Malik’s words with mock-pretense while he holds Malik by the waist from behind making sure to keep his own crotch off the vicinity of Malik’s ass.

Malik is torn between scowling confusion and relishing the tight drag of Altaïr’s palms down his flanks, and Altaïr uses this moment of puzzlement to his advantage and advances further down. He bends, nosing around Malik’s lower back, evolving the ingenious idea of sidetracking even lower, to treat himself, because he’s suddenly having an appetite for Malik’s ass. His hands unhook from Malik’s hips and latch bluntly onto his cheeks squeezing to expose him.

He stoops down, he’s eager for it.

And it isn’t Malik’s broken yelp that surprises him but the startling blow as Malik suddenly smacks him across the temple. The hit reminds him of the recurring throb in his cheek where the slap had landed and he wonders if his face has somehow grown inclined to being Malik’s hitting target.

The smack doesn’t manage to throw him quite off balance but the message is as clear as they come.

“You’re clean.”  
  
“But—“

“I’ve had worse things than ass in my mouth,” Altaïr throws wittily, but Malik doesn’t know whether to take it as encouragement or insult and Altaïr senses his reluctance quickly.

“Trust me.”

“I don’t trust you.”

“Pretend you trust me for a moment,” Altaïr asks. It doesn’t sound like a plea but it is one.

For all Altaïr knows, Malik might not even like it. But he wants to try his luck and gauge Malik’s reaction by his body’s response. When Malik at last looks away facing the pillows Altaïr knows he is at least given a green light.

Yet he’s tense, he’s still, and not in a proper position, at that. His back is curved more outwards than inwards, his limbs are stiff with anxiety, and it won’t do. Altaïr sacrifices his hold on Malik’s rear temporarily to slide the heels of his palms into the crevice between Malik’s shoulder blades, to push the midpoint of his back downwards.

Finally, Malik begins to arch the right way, as if to escape Altaïr’s touch. The movement begins as a protest and ends as surrender.

“Don’t worry, you’ve nothing I haven’t seen before,” Altaïr soothes and Malik doesn’t want to hear it because he needs soothing, and he’s uncomfortable knowing that he does.

“Stop talking,” Malik breathes fretfully in return, but he makes a relinquishing gesture and gives in to the pressure of Altaïr’s hands until it’s no longer a mere escape from his touch. Curiosity wins him over.

Having corrected Malik’s posture Altaïr takes to steering himself down the midline of his back peppering the groove of his spine with sloppy, open-mouthed kisses along the way; he lifts him further by the hips by the time he arrives at the small of his back. His hands grab a hold of Malik’s ass to squeeze tightly, eagerly.

Altaïr had wanted to get Malik to lie on his chest while he has him on his knees, he had thought it would push Malik past his boundaries, but one deliberate squeeze and Malik fell on his own volition, pushing his head and shoulders into the sheets until his ass is sticking out quite nicely and urging itself into Altaïr’s clutch.

He can already make out the sound of eager breathing.

For a moment he peruses Malik’s plump, much-desired rear and everything that is offered to him and wonders how Malik will respond to having his ass attended to, and his cock hardens with intrigue.

Malik hardly has experience and he’s new to this kind of touch in particular, but it’s nothing that Altaïr can’t remedy with a warm-up, an introductory caress across his hole as he rubs his fingertip against it while sucking a mouthful of skin to his left. He meanders down the curve of his soft, supple cheek carrying his tongue in a wet, moist, warm trail before he sweeps in with a gusto and flattens his tongue and _licks_.

Altaïr hears the sudden discharge of a hot breath.

He repeats himself regardless, applying his tongue to where it’s needed, glancing sideward to gauge Malik’s reaction, catching him wide-eyed as he moves his mouth in soundless comment, critical, satisfied, perplexed.

Then he hears the softest throaty moan that shoots prickles up his spine.

It’s only a moment before he sees Malik’s eyes roll back as he submits to his oral affections, and it takes Altaïr no time at all to work him into the sensation and get everything warm, wet, and slick with saliva, until Altaïr gets lost in it and Malik starts pushing his ass eagerly into his face.

“ _Gods_ …” Malik mumbles almost unintelligibly, “how does it feel this good…?”

There is moisture in his words and his vowels are so quaintly softened by pleasure; he has allowed arrows of arousal to rewrite his speech, and it leaves no doubt in Altaïr’s mind that Malik is for the very first time discovering what a good tongue on the hole can do to a body.

Altaïr returns to his treat with a leery smile, with a flattened tongue pacing up-and-down, with eager, moist lips, and he works on Malik until he’s weeded out all trace of resistance, until Malik has completely succumbed, aware that giving in to Altaïr’s seasoned touch is a mild sacrifice whose demands on his conscience are so small in comparison with the pleasures it offers.

The next time he peeks sideward, Malik has his eyes closed and his breathing is shallow and he is twisting the sheets into sweaty knots around him, he is pushing back against Altaïr.

Malik’s response to sexual touch is a little peculiar; the fact that he turns rowdy and wanton and so unlike his usual self when pleasured turns Altaïr on. Malik is all nasal moans and soft lapses into panting and he loves it, he loves everything that Altaïr is giving him, so Altaïr gives him more. He lets him feel the strength of his hands as he keeps him spread and he laps at him, circling, making his circles perfectly round and perfectly closed, and makes other less recognizable shapes, alters his licks before Malik can grow accustomed to any one sensation.

It’s easy, shamelessly easy to bury his face in Malik’s ass and put his mouth to work to turn Malik’s former dignity into an antique. In these few precious moments Altaïr can persuade him to surrender, and in this rare subdued state Malik belongs to Altaïr and not himself.

And before he knows it, Malik is spreading his legs wider apart and reaching around to grope for the back of Altaïr’s head pushing him in, fisting whatever strands of hair he manages to seize in his delirium.

Altaïr hums throatily in response to this and with his husband’s ass shoved so tightly to his mouth, he feels compelled to work his tongue in as deeply as is humanly possible, and Malik praises his work with a broken moan.

He fights with Malik’s clutch for a better angle and access, he presses his tongue liberally in a slick, penetrating pattern, teaches him what it feels like to surrender—Altaïr is aware of how much trust is needed for Malik to cling on the back of his head with a fistful of hair while he tries to shove more of himself into Altaïr’s mouth and press himself back to rhythmically ride on the penetration of Altaïr’s stiff tongue as he does now. It needs wantonness and trust and surrender, and Malik is all.

Altaïr savors it: his body, the way he responds, the way he sounds, the way their mutual attraction has tricked him into this state of unashamed abandon.

The clench on his scalp and hair mellows only after Altaïr’s tongue starts to get tired, sluggish, and he resorts to performing with his lips. Malik slackly breaks the hold dragging his limb back towards the mattress. The moment he breaks the clasp Altaïr’s hand shoots out to catch Malik’s, capturing it for a fleeting moment into his own, but Malik is too out of this world to appreciate the hold of hands and Altaïr lets him go shortly thereafter.

Though undermined by his tired tongue, Altaïr can hardly bring himself to dislodge his mouth from his treat, but he makes a vacation pulling back to admire his work; beyond, down on the mattress, Malik’s half-lidded eyes are glossily coated by lust and there is a hue of red on his cheeks fondly growing richer with time and his back is a perfect arc of submission. Beneath him, Malik’s rear is spit-slicked and shiny with saliva where he’s been lavishing his attention, and below, he is hard and leaking pre-come copiously and sullying the sheets in the process.

The thought of using more than just his mouth arrives to Altaïr fashionably late; he lacks oil and he’s aware of this lack, so he uses saliva as an opportune imitation of it, coating his fingers generously. There is his other hand, too—and there is no better accomplice in what he’s about to do—which sneaks between Malik’s legs hoisting him up by his belly a tad more, pushing his rear further up, before he retrieves his hand stopping suitably below Malik’s sack where he could cradle it in his palm.

Malik dutifully takes the fingers that Altaïr is offering him.

He’d suspected some resistance from Malik’s body, yet all he receives is damp puffs of air peppered with breathy moans that would have been amusing, were it not for the sight of him melting away under Altaïr’s care. Once sheathed to the last knuckle, with no more fingers than last night, Altaïr presses downwards, pushes, circles, rubs with the pads of his fingers until Malik’s voice is something utterly guttural. Until Malik’s hips respond with a lovely undulation, pushing back against him, enjoying the thickness, slickness, the deep and deliberate press of Altaïr’s fingers against the right place.

It’s exhilarating to have this power over Malik’s inexperienced body, it’s dazzling how much liberty Malik allows his own body in ruling over him. His body has the patience of an insatiable child, much like Altaïr’s pride has the patience of an insatiable child; it’s this patience, the lack of it, that will eventually make a chess pawn of Malik’s own pride and surrender him to his basest needs, he will take everything Altaïr offers him, he will crave it, he will long to have something nice and bigger than fingers inside him. The hunger will never leave him alone, so long as Altaïr keeps getting him used to the pleasant stretch and the feeling of fullness.

Altaïr is willing to walk the slow path to get there.

Even if he has to attend to Malik’s pleasure alone, even if this request upon his own body is unreasonable—he is willing to walk it.

He penetrates deeply, emerges only slightly, taking every opportunity to guide the pads of his fingers to the swell of Malik’s prostate with carefully manufactured presses. Malik keeps on bucking into his fingers when he isn’t getting enough pressure where he needs it, and before long, Altaïr feels and sees a tensing of his body, his throat suddenly emits a faint whine, his body tightens around Altaïr’s fingers.

Malik seems as though he himself will faint, or come, or both of these will converge into one point where Malik loses himself and Altaïr loses Malik.

Altaïr could allow him to come.

But the simplest way is also the most impractical one; Altaïr wants to watch him more. No matter how he juggles with schedules he can’t put off Malik’s imminent climax for long, but he can seize whatever time he is allowed to steal to enjoy him a bit longer, and hope that Malik won’t turn his back on him once lucidity peeks through the pleasure-ridden prison bars of lust.

He leans in again, replacing fingers with mouth, and it’s easy to get his fill when he’s _this_ hungry for the supple, pliant ass that’s begging for his tongue’s caress. His mouth is moist and his tongue flattened as he slowly teases himself in, he snakes his hand beneath to seek out Malik’s cock, hard and eager, between his legs.

He keeps playing his tongue and plying his fingers in all the right ways and Malik responds in a long-drawn, deep-voiced moan, pushes back into Altaïr’s face, pushes down into Altaïr’s fist that’s stroking him off, and he won’t last long, he’ll last shorter than Altaïr has hoped him to last. It’s no use dragging it out. As he speeds up his strokes, he splays his free hand beneath Malik’s cock, with fingers curled and palm cupped, to welcome his issue and spare him a mess on sheets.

He could have used this hand to touch himself instead, and he does want to touch himself—the possibility of it has lingered around the rims of his mind, but he tunes in on Malik’s body, inspecting his responses for signs that will appear, somewhere, sometime, in the assault of pleasure Altaïr is giving him. The anticipated signs show and Malik stiffens up and chokes off a moan and the familiar shadow of a hush passes over him as he tumbles over the precipice and comes in reams into Altaïr’s awaiting palm while Altaïr milks him for what he’s worth tonight.

Malik is still out of it and Altaïr’s hand is still on his ass when it hits him.

He hasn’t thought of it.

But for a moment Malik is incapacitated and Altaïr’s erection is straining before he quickly hooks a thumb into his breeches and pulls down, and his cock falls heavily against the cleft of Malik’s rear. Altaïr wonders if Malik even feels his hardness in the throes of the afterglow.

It’s thrilling to imagine it.

To align his cock against Malik’s ass pressing its length between the plump, spit-slicked cheeks and imagine for a moment how it would feel to sheathe his cock inside his husband and hear him moan like before.

Everything in him screams to guide himself past the relaxed ring of muscles and penetrate, but he manages to fight his way through this rebellion and retreat from the danger of temptation. His cock wants it, but the answer is no. Malik isn’t ready to go this far. He’s not yet geared for the girth of Altaïr’s shaft and Altaïr is still getting him used to the feeling of being filled and Malik will require more training to receive him with ease.

Altaïr would like to squeeze his cheeks together to encourage more friction but he’s cradling the pool of semen in one palm and he can do little more than drag the underside of his cock across, smoothing his free palm from above for some semblance of pressure. A small fantasy he will allow himself today.

He indulges in it for a moment longer, then retreats, before Malik can register what he’s just done, and the feeling it gives him might be the greatest physical satisfaction he will possibly receive today.

He tugs his breeches up and leaves the bed before Malik can roll onto his back. Perhaps he needs a moment. Perhaps Altaïr does, too.

In the kitchen he washes his hands thoroughly in the lavabo and listens for any sounds that might come from the bedroom, hearing none.

On the ground, beneath the kitchen counter and next to the half-consumed sack of flour, is the wine amphora—behind it hides the olive oil amphora, he has learned them all by heart now—and he transfers some of its contents into an empty pitcher, swills the wine around inside the container, and takes a generous swig straight from the pitcher swishing it around his mouth. The wine’s tart sweetness scalds his tongue and throat reminding him incorrigibly of Desmond before it settles warmly in the pit of his belly. He owes Desmond an apology. Two, perhaps.

He savors another swallow of Malik’s sweet, mellow-colored wine and contemplates buying another amphora. On the market. Where he will unerringly have to apologize. To the blacksmith he punched by mistake.

That’s two men he owes apologies to.

Tomorrow. Tomorrow he owes.

Now, Altaïr begins to assemble his budding knowledge of Malik’s body.

He doesn’t like a mix of pain with his pleasure, though this particular finding is still under construction since he’s tested it only once, he responded very well to fingers and might consequently respond well to cock, he undoubtedly enjoys Altaïr’s mouth on his ass. The latter crooks Altaïr’s reddened lips into a lascivious smirk. But most importantly: until he is ready to accept Altaïr’s new role and husbandly duty in bed, Malik’s body needs unremitting distractions lest his conscience latches onto a gap between pleasures and reminds Malik that he has unconsciously submitted to Altaïr.

With this thought in mind, Altaïr saunters back into the bedroom to see what happens when there’s a pause long enough for Malik to regain his senses and reflect on what they’ve done.

Malik is ensconced on a huddle of bed pillows and staring off at some-or-no point on a wall.

Altaïr has expected to find him angry, or mortified, or livid, or reclusive, or in any combination thereof, but it seems as though the cogs of Malik’s mind are working considerably slower today, and in this great state of brewing turmoil his mind has simply deposited him there, half-willing half-confused, half in retreat and half welcoming while he lounges on bed cushions in the nude.

Altaïr considers whether to leave him be and let his mind smooth his embarrassment out, or to approach him and further exhaust his mind’s stubbornness.

He debates himself for a short time and decides he’s not afraid of rejection per se, because he’s gotten used to it. He has more to lose by not taking his chance.

He cuts the distance between them, scales the bed, shuffles over on his knees, suspects he will have to bend all the way over Malik’s body to take him by the wrists and chain them to a pillow above Malik’s head, but Malik’s knees are slightly parted as if he has left enough room for Altaïr to usurp the space between them, so Altaïr squeezes into the opening and fixes himself between the warm press of Malik’s thighs.

It’s comfortable and warm there and Malik’s wrists don’t resist the yoke of Altaïr’s grip. He allows his hands to be shackled overhead and the tips of his elbows jut out non-threateningly at each side of Altaïr’s head.

His great black eyes, however, are fixed on Altaïr’s face in poise and defiance.

“I don’t want anymore,” he concludes in a murmur even as his body begs to differ and his cock rests half-hardened atop his belly. Altaïr had thought that he’s exhausted him but Malik is young and eager and his libido is as lively as Altaïr’s had been when he first discovered fleshly pleasure.

“That’s alright. But I want a reward.”

A frown envelops Malik’s face and he is tempted to say _I give no rewards_ but what leaves his mouth is:

“What is it you want?”

“I want to kiss you.“

Malik’s lips part, he wants to say no.

He recalls this morning suddenly. Leonardo’s admonishment soars to a high and secure position in his mind to make him reconsider whether Altaïr deserves his too coarse a temper at present.

He glances up to answer, parting his gaze from Altaïr’s hard chest that peeks through the gap on tunic opened by gravity, and suddenly finds himself in the world of bright eyes and paradisal amber.

The receding sunlight to Altaïr’s left has wonderfully rendered the moist, dark brownish-yellow of his iris with a still darker rim and the suggestion of gold dust constellating round his pupils, and the light in his eyes looks as handsome as the shadow of stubble along his chiseled jaw and above his lips that are dusky and wet, wet like rain-kissed peaches.

Without any assistance of his better judgment, Malik nods.

“You won’t kick me aside like last time?”

The very suggestion of it offends Malik, though it shouldn’t.

“No. But I will end it when I no longer want to reward you,” Malik says and his speech is still slurred from the aftermaths of a climax, or the sight of Altaïr’s eyes.

“Fair enough.”

Malik is waiting for him to make an advance. The initiative is Altaïr’s burden, but Malik licks his lips while he awaits—he cares enough to want to make a decent impression of himself. Altaïr monitors him as he slopes his neck and sees Malik’s eyelashes flutter closed and his mouth part ever so slightly before he spans the distance between their bodies with a touch of lips.

Malik’s lips are pleasantly wet and his mouth warm and sufficiently inviting, but he lies there in passive suspense and Altaïr breaks the lip-lock.

“Don’t just take what I give you. Kiss me back.”

“I don’t know how.“

“Learn.”

Altaïr’s breath is sultry and damp, he smacks of wine and lust when Malik finally opens up to him, wide enough that Altaïr’s tongue is around and alongside his own before Malik follows along, tenaciously. Altaïr hums in approval at the way Malik’s tongue gently envelops his as he pushes against it.

They break with a sigh and the kiss lingers on Altaïr’s lips like sugar after a bite of cake.

He tries to say something, starts, and feels himself pulled into another kiss and Malik’s hands are suddenly, somehow, in his hair and Malik’s tongue is lodged deep inside his mouth. He is clumsy but teachable, willing to learn through trial and error.

He kisses him until their lips go numb.

When they part Malik’s hands are in his hair still, and their bellies are pressed together as tightly as their lips have been only moments before, and Malik is as hard as Altaïr but they’re not equally free. Malik blinks up at him and Altaïr enjoys the haze of pleasure that has settled on his face before it dawns on Malik that he is supposed to _allow_ this not _enjoy_ it.

Altaïr watches him and fears, oblivious to the fact that Malik feels a sudden, inexplicable desire to kiss him again instead of fleeing, and in a pinch he reverts to his earlier lesson and grinds down against Malik to corrupt him with pleasure.

Malik breaks into an abrupt moan which he then completely batters by stiffly clutching his lips to hide that it’s ever happened.

That must be it. Altaïr suspects Malik will scramble away now as fast as he can and leave him to solitude, and what he’s not privy to is that Malik feels ripe for a new climax and is, actually, in real danger of arriving there too soon—he can feel it already beginning, tipping him toward disgrace.

Altaïr is preemptively and foolishly retreating when Malik’s hands drop to pull him in by the front of his tunic before he brazenly starts tugging it off, and the next time Altaïr is unbending himself it’s not to retreat but to comply with Malik’s tacit demand and shed the clothes.

Malik then finds himself glued to cushions on one end, to Altaïr on the other, and he finds himself cornered and his movements grow more deliberate but his mind makes less and less sense. The next time Altaïr bucks into him he dives in to take Malik’s mouth and end another sound prematurely, to taste the moan before Malik can break it.

Altaïr enjoys Malik’s moans; they’re a simple and pleasant drug.

With the next buck Altaïr does more than just wanton thrusting against Malik, he pushes down purposefully with the combined warm press of his breeches against Malik’s sex in search of attention, recognition, anything, momentarily reminding Malik that his own hardness is confined. It’s a call for mercy and Malik responds to it by reaching down blindly (his mouth his stuffed full of Altaïr’s tongue) and hooking as many fingers as he manages—and that’s exactly two—into the belt of his breeches tugging the front down Altaïr’s length and tucking the drawstring that holds them up underneath Altaïr’s sack.

Altaïr realigns himself and his heavyish sack alights atop Malik’s forcing a soft grunt out of him which Malik swallows within the depths of his own throat. Aligned like this, their lengths are near identical, but Altaïr’s girth is nothing Malik would be able to take anytime soon. Altaïr is almost distraught with the want to rut against the body beneath, he wishes he had thought of oil to ease the friction, but anything will do.

Malik is seeking out a more comfortable position when Altaïr’s hips start bearing down on him and the steady rocking slide of Altaïr’s cock against his own makes him realize his new predicament: here, like this, Altaïr is exposed to every sound of his restless throat and where sheets used to be a half-decent muffler of his voice he now feels bare beyond his state of undress and he feels a need to hold it in.

Malik tries to be quieter, but nothing is quiet enough for him.

Everything seems louder when he’s face-to-face with this man. Altaïr shows him mercy by latching onto his mouth to stifle the tenacious hum of moans and groans and everything in-between, and Malik latches onto Altaïr in turn—it’s nothing Altaïr expects and everything Malik has wanted to do ever since he’s acquired a taste for Altaïr’s body.

His hands grow positively dapper and begin blatantly groping Altaïr’s upper body. Nothing—not Altaïr’s shifting pectorals, neither the bunched ridges of his abdominals, nor the ladder of his ribs, or the vee of his hips—receive the mercy of exclusion from Malik’s pawing, greedy touch.

It had long occurred to Altaïr that Malik is attracted to his body, but never to this extent. He can’t fathom _why_ —it’s the same body almost every warrior acquires over time, it’s nothing but rugged hardness shaped by labor and marred by scars, it has nothing of the suppleness or elegance of Malik’s body that’s lithe where Altaïr’s is bursting with muscle.

But Malik’s hands seem to disagree and his velvety fingers claw themselves in every crevice and drag themselves across every swell of muscles, before his palms become choosy, settling on the taut bulk of Altaïr’s pectorals and _squeezing_ while he moans wantonly at their fullness. His hands establish themselves there with a firm grip and the pads of his thumbs hook in the gully between the warrior’s pecs until Altaïr’s nipples stiffen and settle quite handsomely into the press of Malik’s palms.

Malik grows still then, and Altaïr uses this stillness to snake a hand between them (carefully, to not upset Malik’s selfish hold on his pectorals) and collect both their members into his fist. A thick dollop of Malik’s pre-come dribbles down the back of his fingers when he squeezes, mashing their cockheads together, and Malik makes a wonderful sound at that, whimpering and high, and Altaïr does it again before he proceeds to stroke them off while Malik proceeds to drown sounds of pleasure inside Altaïr’s mouth.

Arousal in Altaïr’s gut burns deep, white, and furious.

He marvels at the sight of what he’s capable of doing, he rolls easily against the smaller body beneath, thrusting his length against Malik’s until they’re little short of grinding, thrusting, _rutting_. Malik is pushed to his very limits, but unable to tear away from Altaïr’s roving hips as he thrusts into the man’s fist fighting for space with Altaïr’s own cock, and when a fresh trickle of arousal squeezes its way through Malik’s thighs pressing them harder to Altaïr’s sides, he feels the pleasant tug of an orgasm and meets his limit.

Altaïr follows helplessly only two heartbeats later finishing across Malik’s lean belly with a gruff moan.

It’s not immediately, but Malik unchains Altaïr, splaying his thighs wide open as his muscles trip over their own pleasure and land in an ungainly mess across the mattress. Altaïr watches, acquaints himself with the view of Malik, spent, slouching with his head tipped back against the pillow and breathing the last traces of exertion out of his lungs. There’s the languid hold on Altaïr’s chest. Fingers loosely curled with disuse. Ribbons of seed splattered across his belly. The deep-tinted spread of a flush on his cheeks as his teeth glisten and peek beneath parted lips. He makes the ungraceful limpness of limbs look graceful. He makes it look beautiful, _beautiful_ , beautiful.

“Malik?”

He opens his eyes and blinks through the haze. Altaïr’s gaze darts over his expression to preserve it, to memorize it, the fullness of his overused lips and their rosy hue, the depth of his eyes, the abyss of blackness round his pupils.

“I apologize.”

“What for?” asks his voice.

“For putting the burden of false accusation upon your shoulders.”

Malik sighs and tips his head back and it once again falls against the pillow just as his eyelids fall closed, “You seem to have grown quite comfortable accusing me.”

“As you grew comfortable rejecting _this_ ,” Altaïr insists in sync with a timely roll of hips to remind Malik of what they’ve just done.

Malik is keeping his eyes firmly shut but can’t hide the blush in like manner. Altaïr’s had his moment of fun but he doesn’t want to alienate Malik by poking him around with taunts.

“I hope my apology will find your ear,“ he whispers into Malik’s ear and gives him the mercy of knowing that he isn’t watching him in such a compromised state.

“You’re seized by unneccessary worry. I haven’t been touched by other men.“

Altaïr knows now.

 

* * *

 

 

It takes Altaïr a while to repair the damage he had inflicted upon his own home earlier and Malik lets him do this on his own. Altaïr feels he has deserved it. He collects the shards on his own, rolls up the soiled carpet without assistance, pulls up the dining table and benches alone.

By the time he’s done what he could for today and gotten ready for sleep, Malik is already in bed.

He realizes that Malik has not fallen asleep and has, in fact, waited for him in bed, but he is greeted by nothing other than silence and the silky hiss of clean, crisp cotton sheets as he slithers beneath the bedcover.

Malik turns his back to him. He reads it as much-awaited invitation.

Malik wears an embroidered nightshirt—its rutted embroidery grazes against the tips of Altaïr’s fingers after he loops an arm around Malik’s waist and settles his hand against Malik’s collarbone.

Malik stiffens up without delay.

“You can’t hold me.”

“Why not—?”

“I don’t want it.”

Malik counts three heartbeats of silence before the warmth of Altaïr’s mouth seeps through the fabric of his nightshirt as Altaïr kisses his shoulder, then breathes himself full of the peachy, balmy scent that seems to follow his young husband everywhere.

Altaïr thinks of inevitable retreat to his territory.

“Can I at least have your hand back?”

“When I regain my side of the bed.”

Malik counts the heartbeats again and can’t see Altaïr scowling behind him.

“It used to be my side of bed before you annexed it,“ he responds to Altaïr’s silence.

“You never told me.”

“You know now.”

There is a pregnant pause and then:

“There’s nothing wrong with that side, is there?”

“Of _course_ not. I just prefer that side to this one.”

He hears a tug on his belly before he feels it, and suddenly Altaïr is rolling him over and flipping them around and clambering over Malik’s body as he swaps their places on the bed. For the short moment he hovers over Malik, legs astride and arms framing Malik’s head, Altaïr bends down to steal a kiss, touching their lips, and no further than that. Malik responds by pushing his lips into Altaïr’s, and Altaïr could get used to this.

He shimmies left to assume Malik’s former place. He keeps his distance but Malik puts his hand inside Altaïr’s and the warrior holds it a bit roughly, as if Malik’s hand is a tiny mouse he’s captured, as if it will flee the moment he unlocks the grip.

It means little to Malik, but it’s intimately and securely connected with Altaïr’s heart.

 

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> The ancients totally had fast-food, I shit you not. Just look at the Pompeian [thermopolium](http://www.bbc.co.uk/history/ancient/romans/pompeii_art_gallery_03.shtml). ~~look, i'm just trying to defend altair's sausage hot-dog here~~
> 
> I need to shorten these graphic sex scenes between Altair and Malik... Same old vice, tough to grow out of.


	12. Chapter 10

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> on a side-note, I learned that chopping wood increases testosterone production by 46.8% after finishing this chapter. the more you know...
> 
>  **!Correction!:** there’s been an unplanned change in dates. The general assembly mentioned in the last chapter will be held in two days (so in next chapter), not "one sunrise henceforth" (this chapter). Thanks for your attention, enjoy!

 

 

 

* * *

 

 

Altair feels the emptiness in his hand long before he opens his eyes.

The hand lies half-way across the midpoint of the mattress, with no one there to hold it. When he brings it to his face, he finds it wealthy with remnants of Malik’s touch, feels its peachy scent across his palm and hears the whisper of Malik’s presence in the kitchen, like yesterday.

Malik is kneading some sort of dough when Altair hauls himself towards the kitchen. This time, Malik senses his presence right away, but responds to it with only a tensing of his shoulders, and a silence that Altair immediately attributes to bashfulness. He studies Malik carefully—the agitated rise and fall of his chest, the stubborn way in which Malik’s eyes strain to avoid his while the heel of his floury hand keeps molding the dough with a fierceness that has little to do with cooking.

It’s neither the first time that Malik is imprisoned in a (un)comfortable fortress of angry bashfulness, nor the first time that Altair will try to break its walls with a well-intentioned jest.

“The hickeys look good on you,” Altair says, mindfully, to avoid giving his lust oomph.

The rounded dough suddenly looks as if it’s been sentenced to death under the vicious clench of Malik’s floury fists; it spills between his fingers, deformed, and from Malik spills a stubborn silence.

What follows isn’t an argument. It’s commitment to this eerie silence, a quiet resistance, a cold war. There has to be anger among them too. And refusal to explain what the anger is about. Altair knows, better than Malik, that there are things one doesn’t want to explain to others. _He_ has never wanted to explain war. But he feels he deserves words today, and Malik has a recurring, deep-seated resentment for explaining what upsets him.

“That was a joke,” Altair appends hastily, thinking he’s crossed a boundary.

“ _You’re_ a joke.”

Malik’s tone lacks humor, and reeks of mockery. Fleetingly, Altair suffers through a sick, squeamish feeling in his stomach, as tough he’s looked at the bowels of a ripped-up enemy—an occasional and unwelcome guest to his memory.

The seam goes on then, cutting right through the very center of Altair’s chest. He feels it; a seam that says there is no way to stop this. He recognizes it immediately, belatedly, from the clench of Malik’s jaw, from the way Malik always grits words past his teeth when he gives himself to fury, from the way his features have arranged into a large immobile mask. He realizes with ridiculous lucidity that Malik has decided to not only avoid conversation again, but that he’s _rejecting_ Altair from the position he’d secured himself last night.

Altair stands still, because there’s nothing else he trusts himself to do. The astonishment lifts its hands up to his mouth, parting it numbly long before he can find his voice again.

“We’re back to _this_ again? Is it because I touch you, or because you enjoy it? Because you don’t know what you want? Or because you don’t _want_ what you want? Maybe there’s some other reason I haven’t articulated?”

A little roughened, the questions just came out before he’s censored himself. Malik’s rejection stripped him raw and there’s nothing to keep him in check.

Malik’s eyebrows pucker into a scowl to allow anger to a high and secure position on his face in lieu of his former mask. For a moment he’s too angered to keep his eyes away from Altair and he glares at him askance. His pupil glows like a point of a sun-lit sword and, like many times before, the apparition of Nokem’s fiery visage teases itself into Altair’s head at this sight of Malik’s glowering face.

They’re not one step ahead compared to where they’ve stood yesterday. They’re back to where they’ve been earlier. One step ahead, three leaps backwards.

Altair feels cheated.

He feels an emotion and he names it as anger. It’s how he recognizes it.

 _When you tire of being a sulky child, I’ll be there_ he wants to say, but the words can’t quite squeeze past his constricted throat. All that he allows himself is an inward sigh of submission to fate, the fate being Malik’s impenetrable mood swings.

“I feel like my departure is the only thing that will ever satisfy you.”

“Then why _don’t_ you leave?” Malik huffs out pointedly, “Save us both this pointless conversation.” 

Altair wonders how long it will take him to level out the bumpy grounds of their marriage, whether to keep touching Malik at all if it leads to such sharp fluctuations in his mood, whether he’s lost Malik’s comforting hand again. Whether his marriage is heading anywhere at all.

With ambitions obstructed, he feels there’s nothing left to do but storm out of home and stomp downstairs, into the buzz of the courtyard.

His feet carry him towards the water-well, and nowhere past it. His body stops there—there, on the only unoccupied washing basin, where _Malik_ washes clothes.

Up, in the kitchen, he has felt an anger that’s only been budding and not yet fully ripened enough to be called fury. But here, Altair is livid. He’s livid in the ways Malik is livid, only worse.

Something in his flesh feels the sting of thirst for violence; until his resistance to this impulse is being stretched to the snapping edge of his boundaries; until he realizes he could have actually hurt Malik had he not retreated in time. 

Blindly, his arms shoot forward, hands pressing down where he’s gripping the curvilinear water-well ledge and losing a battle to the stone—his knuckles, shivering with suppressed violence, blanch and buckle where his fingers grip on believing they can crack stone.

The conversation around him grows thinner.

The washing girls start following his antics with wary eyes, as though they’ve sensed that a warrior’s mood has been moved to a darker part of his mind unfamiliar to them and unknown to this courtyard.

They watch him in a way which tells Altair that he’ll never be to them what Malik is to them.

He never intended to leave bad impressions on his community. But there he is: Altair, one of Al Mualim’s most valued (ex)warriors, a refugee from his own house, a stranger to people closest to him.

A war-worn man teetering on the verge of lashing out at the first poor thing that dares to approach him, a man chewed by two opposing factions simultaneously: sorrow and chained violence, both united by their common lack of understanding of Malik. His fickle moods and conflicting denials. His feelings for Altair, if any, and expectations of future, if any. Malik has a belligerent spirit. Altair will remember this, he has a good memory. But Altair has woken up this morning hoping to cement the closeness that had bridged a gap between them last night, not to learn that his failure is absurd, horrible, excruciating, and that his endeavors are a hopeless groping among dissolving things.

Of all the responses to rejection he could have had, he graduated from astonishment to this sudden urge to _hurt_ something.  

It’s different from his anger outbreaks from before—he feels it seep into his muscle and sinew until he’s given himself to the worst in him and can scarcely go about without hurting someone lest he finds some appropriate occupation for his fists.

Altair has allowed his anger recognition and food, and he knows he has to end it before it grows too large.

He keeps the stony ledge in his grip and thinks until his head is a crowded place.

Whatever restraint he has in him keeps his head down by the temples, his fingers soldered into gripping fists.

A few moments of confusion pass and Altair feels something gurgling desperately in the pit of his stomach. He’s too well aware that he can’t afford the expenses of violence. He thinks or hopes that in a moment or two the urge will leave off, wear down, but it doesn’t, and he has to spend it somewhere where it won’t make mincemeat out of anyone, or else—

A hand lands on his shoulder in call for attention, his head snaps sideways towards the intruder.

“You alright, mate?”

The wrinkled state of Mary’s brow smacks of compassion that Altair would have received, were he not who he is.

She must have responded to Altair’s antics which raised a few eyebrows round the courtyard. Her pragmatic concern, however devoid of deep sympathy, is easier to read off her expression than compassion as she searches his face for signs of trouble. She’s a seasoned city guard, doubtlessly skilled in smelling trouble off people.

“Is there any work to be done?” Altair blurts out. He needs his hands busy. He needs it, or else—

As though she could suddenly understand his need for distraction, she gives a single, curt nod, then juts her chin at the general direction of the boiling-room, “I could use a pair of hands for chopping firewood.”

He nods numbly in response, releases the slab of stone ringing the water-well, and feels the imprint of pain the grip has left in his bones while he follows Mary’s lead. They go straight into the boiling-room on the first ring-floor, no time wasted.

Inside, it feels airless, stuffier than the last time they’d chopped wood together.

There’s no talk until Mary’s foot has thrust the second chopping block in front of him and they both own an ax.

“Trouble with my kid?” she breaks the silence. Altair has by now recognized that Mary had affectionately pet-named Malik her kid.

Mary doesn’t strike Altair as someone who chitchats to kill time, so she must have unpretentious interest in their odd marriage. He sidesteps the question. Talk is not why he’s come here.

The crack of splintering wood soon becomes her only response and she doesn’t appear to take issues with his taciturnity and responds by tackling her own portion of work. Noiselessly, they ax through the pile of boulders in tandem, with the angry glare of the hearth in front of them and a quivering shadow at their backs.

Altair channels his built-up concoction of unpardonable impulses into the manual labor, muscles his way through the work until his hands grow numb and sore and his arms flare up into a spasm of pain as the result of misuse. Compared to dealing with Malik, working himself into fatigue is an easy billet. Yet once the fatigue of his muscles transfers to his thoughts, he loses the strength to keep them in manacles and his mind begins to stray to what has caused him pain.

Malik is a roundabout defense. He’s a border prohibiting trespassers.

In an effort to explain his own violent rage to himself, Altair, in some inane way, even manages to feel abused. As though an intrinsic part of him has decided that the only way to avoid being abused is to be the abuser. Altair deals with abusers by killing them. That’s what he had done in war. And something in Altair had reacted repulsively to Malik’s undue treatment of him.

This conclusion, this explanation of the origin of his visceral reaction, gives Altair a peace of mind and lulls him into a less rage-driven and more pensive labor. After a certain time, he starts paying more attention to his surroundings until sounds start knocking against his ears, softly at first, then louder and louder. The distant hubbub of noise laced by childish titter and muffled by the heavy door of the boiling-room squeezes occasionally through the unremitting snapping of firewood and crackle of fire.

He is far ahead of Mary. His rage has given haste to his efforts.

Altair has halfway convinced himself into a brief break when the heavy door creaks timidly and a pair of mother-and-child joins them inside the boiling-room.

Mary’s reaction is instantaneous and she puts her ax to a rest and pauses expectantly.

Anne wrinkles the corner of her mouth into a half-smile and Altair finds himself at the receiving end of it. Anne’s olive tunic seems to be buttoned wrong, as if she’s been nursing Talia not long ago. Altair’s own shabby little nod pales in response to Anne’s greeting.

A small arm pops sidewise out of the oblong swathe that Anne is holding to her chest, tearing Altair’s attention away. As if on cue, as if summoned by the warrior’s wish to hold the child, Anne chooses to walk past Altair to reach Mary, though her path towards either of them equals in distance.

With a welcoming murmur she offers him Talia, making him wonder how plainly his face displays thoughts, or worse—feelings.

“She’s quite fond of you. It makes it easier for me to ask if you can watch her in a few days time,” before transferring the suckling into his arms, Anne looks at him in polite expectancy, aware that he won’t refuse. Even if he did, Malik won’t.

“I can.”

The bundle is entrusted into his hold and the weight of the infant lifts a weight off his chest.

Anne leaves her there and goes on to approach Mary. Though Anne has avoided a poorly-tied bundle, a few mossy tufts of hair keep on defying the confines of the swathe and sticking out as rebellious wisps. Talia peers up at her new carrier timorously, before her tiny fist shoots up to seize Altair’s awaiting finger. The squeal of her innocent glee teases Altair into an unexpected smile.

Of all the people milling about his community, this infant must be the only person truly gladdened by his presence.

Altair tweaks the baby on the cheek with the only two fingers she hasn’t yet clasped into her tiny fists and a deep-seated feeling of satisfaction perches itself atop his shoulders. As though caring for _someone_ feels like caring for himself.

During this capricious delirium of affection for Talia, the wild, unwarranted thought of releasing Malik from marriage bonds and adopting a child negotiates itself into his head in this moment of weakness, and the notion of divorcing Malik sends him into into a temporary state of literal blindness.

For a moment he feels nothing but the tight clasp around his fingers, the soft smack of a kiss behind his back where Anne and Mary have been having a hushed exchange. He feels dazzled and dizzy. The bizarre delirium, or panic, or worry, or sickness, suddenly breaks as Altair remembers that Malik can’t divorce without his consent, that the very idea of it is implausible, that the possibility of it is tied only to a _mutual_ split-up—something that Altair will never agree to.

His head has to do some more banning of such thoughts before he can devote his undiluted focus to Talia, his chest has to heave a deep sigh before he can rid himself of envy while he listens to what sounds like a happy marriage taking place behind his back.

A quick glance sideways offers an imposing picture of them: the rounded curve of Anne’s buttock immodestly seized by Mary’s grabby left hand, the right one burrowed snugly against the redhead’s side with fingers digging between her ribs in a thoroughly possessive hold. He looks away and is privy only to the sounds of things that he can't see.

Before long, the women disengage and Anne reclaims the bundle from Altair’s arms, leaving him with an eerie feeling of emptiness and a frightening longing for his husband.

Mary attends to another couple boulders before she calls it a day, leaving Altair to work alone with no questions asked.

The majority of the work he finishes in solitude. He makes no haste.

During the course of his labor, a collection of people keep on wandering into the boiling-room to borrow hot water, or snag a piece or two from the growing pile of firewood. A couple of children drift in to round the hearth and warm their hands in-between games, leaving the heavy door ajar for the cat to slink through to smooch off the warmth.

The fire burns on, thick, bright, and hot, and Altair feels the sweat of warmth and work drench his body till the sleeping tunic he’s not managed to replace is thoroughly dampened and clammy against his skin.

Hours bleed into each other. Until, at last, he leaves no boulder unsplit and his ax dulled, until he is sapped of all muscle power. Until he no longer has an excuse to hide.

With the odor of sulking still centered around him, Altair thinks it best to retreat back home without spending more time outside than a quick reconnoiter requires. A sideways glance reveals to him the state of the courtyard where the community members are floating around in clusters, except for children who disperse at intervals during the hide-and-seek. Of Malik, there is no trace.

Though wary at the door at first, Altair’s attempt to locate Malik fails. The dough he’d caught Malik kneading hours before now lies in a state of abandonment, exactly where Altair had last seen it, though swollen, larger in size.

He’s unsure where Malik has disappeared off to during his absence, but the abandoned state of the unfinished food gives Altair hope that he’ll be rejoined soon. Outside, the blemishes of courtyard babble are remedied by children’s peals of laughter; inside, the home feels deliberately distorted by Malik’s departure. Though he’d seen it empty before, to the warrior it now feels like a vast expanse of void where once a god had stood and where now there’s nothing.

He could light a fire but it would barely help to dispel the gloom of Malik’s absence.

He makes a change of clothes, finding a simple white shirt that can fit him, then lolls himself into the low sofa and feels the numbness of his limbs and the rawness of muscles. There’s nothing for him to breathe but solitude, and the rolled-up carpet saturated with moisture, gluey lotions, and thick oils he had spilled yesterday. He had offered Malik recompense, in the form of cleaning the carpet on his own, along with replenishing his supply of cosmetics, vials, and oils. Yet he thinks it wiser to abstain from doing any cleaning without consulting Malik’s instructions first. Nothing he does these days seems to bring any good.

So he lies there until his face is flaccid and his head sparsely populated by thoughts, then dozes off into an unintended slumber.

 

 

* * *

 

 

He stirs hours later. He is received by a dimmed but equally lonesome room.

Through the window shouldered by the opposite wing of the sofa, Altair can catch glimpses of sky emblazoned with a gilded gloss typical of a sunset. Stranger than his prolonged sleep or absence of hunger is Malik’s own prolonged absence. Altair sullenly realizes that Malik’s absence isn’t an amusing incident, but a deliberate desertion. Even the kitchen now looks as if Malik had fled as well, perhaps to hide.

Altair knows only one place Malik would hide at.

 

 

* * *

 

 

Leonardo is penning something on the corner of a scroll when Altair barges into the studio.

Straightaway, Altair is greeted by two mirroring stares of surprise, and none belong to his husband. Leonardo is rummaging through the mechanisms of that unforgettable water-pump that he occasionally tests on the water-well outside, his assistant engaged with elaborate stitchery.

“I came for Malik,” he announces, barely stifling the urge to poke around the studio himself to find his husband’s hiding spot. There’s no other man Malik trusts that Altair is aware of. Rauf perhaps. But he has no information about the blacksmith’s living quarters. Leonardo’s studio is his best and only guess.

Leonardo’s response is manifold and none of it contains words. He heaves a sigh before his gaze drops—less for resuming work and more for shunning Altair’s eyes—his mouth arranges itself into a downturned line that resembles regret. Remorse for not being able to help, or not being willing to help. Rather than answering, Leonardo has chosen to speak with no words.

Both continue to stare at different things and Altair feels the itch to turn over every nook and cranny of this studio without consent boiling inside him with every wasted moment. He glances around, rapidly, and listens for signs of Malik to sate the urge.

“At least tell me if he’s here,” he implores modestly after a few moments, stinging the compassionate polymath into a response.

“He’s not here, Altair.”

Altair suspects that Leonardo is sheltering him. But Leonardo has said it in such a convincing way that Altair has to believe him. He is amazed, even indignant, but remembering the way he’d responded to Malik’s rejection this morning ultimately explains to him why Malik would resort to avoiding him. _Hiding_ is a possibility he doesn’t want to dwell on. Avoidance is a convenient excuse for _hiding_.

“Altair,” Leonardo suddenly tightens the rope that had held Altair in place before he turned to exit, catching him in mid-flight, “He needs to know that he is loved and needed. Plant the idea, let it grow. Water it occasionally. But don’t push it.”

 _He_ is _loved and needed_ , he wants to say. But the advice results in a complete shutdown. Instead, he bows his head and sees himself out of the studio.

Outside feels like it’s making too much noise. There’s still brightness to the darkening sky above, but Altair’s his day has already turned black. Black like Malik’s hair.

He doesn’t know where to go or whether he’ll see Malik today at all. Or tomorrow. He leaves the studio at his back and drags himself down the short stairs flowing into the yard’s cobblestones.

He’s found no husband, but in the courtyard he is found by Desmond.

It takes Desmond a quick look-over to realize that Altair’s day has taken the wrong turn somewhere and that he won’t be crossing the perimeters of the courtyard today. Altair’s sulking marks their reunion and sets the tone of the rest of their evening together.

It looks like Desmond had intended to take him to the city for this inane reason or another, but seeing him beaten-up with worry, Desmond decides it best to seat him down at the massive table (after Altair refuses to return back home) and procure copious amounts of wine himself.  

An hour, two at most, pass in drinking that renders them silent for the most part, with Altair playing the part of a solid brick wall well and Desmond gauging the best moment to broach the subject of Altair’s mood.

Once, the thought of tracking down Ezio to have him join them crosses Desmond’s mind, but the stench of utter distress reeking off Altair’s sour-faced expression and his slumped figure persuade him to not part from Altair’s side. Though the silence hollows out a certain distance between them, the space between them is narrow. Soon enough, Desmond is feeling a shift; a transfer of sadness from Altair’s shoulders onto his own. He knows without asking that this feeling is the fault of, or at least involves, Malik.

Though the scarlet curtain hiding the tunnel entrance-cum-exit stirs during their drinking session, it’s swelled by a breeze once and shifted by the playing children twice. No one new enters the courtyard. Though the door of Leonardo’s studio opens, it spits out only Salai who’s getting bucketfuls of water from the water-well.

Of Malik, there is still no trace.

Altair’s distress grows beyond simple concern after the nightfall. Above, the window of his home is the only one uncolored by candlelight.

Another kind of light is being set alight behind their backs.

Much like on the night of their return from Al Mualim’s fort, a burgeoning group of community members is gathering to roast ears of corn over a courtyard fire. It’s a cozy and clean dusk, an agreeable night. Just the thing for a fire-gathering.

Altair can’t rid himself of the impression that the people around him appear even jollier than usual, more radiant than before, with some kind of joyous, mysterious palpitation, as happens, for instance, in communities where there are small children, as if to mock him. As if to remind him that his home is empty and his marriage is hollow and that he is, at the end of the day, hauntingly lonely despite the many people circling around him.

He and Desmond transfer upstairs even before the scent of roasted corn starts conquering the courtyard.

It’s a quick and thoughtless decision which Desmond honors by following Altair upstairs, but a decision that’s the subject of regret as soon as they enter the dark, mute home.

Malik’s damned dough on the kitchen counter has risen beyond its intended shape; it’s clear that Malik has actually abandoned it. It’s an eyesore for Altair. He feels like getting rid of it—it reminds him of abandonment. He also fears he might miss Malik’s entrance if he barricades himself inside his home. Desmond is obediently compliant with Altair’s request to resume their previous place at the table in the courtyard.

He kills two birds with one stone by escaping home and bringing Malik’s abandoned dough to Anne as an addition to their roasted corn.

“What will you have?” Anne asks, shifting Talia’s weight around in her hold to accept his donation to the fire-gathering.

They are cracking nuts and drinking tea. Children are poking unevenly-roasted ears of corn across the shimmering embers with their twigs.

Altair declines both.

The mossy-colored liquid in their cups reminds him of the herbal tea that Malik had put into his bandaged hand. His belly is empty but lacks appetite.

He returns to Desmond’s side to continue chugging on wine instead of sipping tea. He almost feels sorry for Desmond for dragging him through a wordless evening but he knows Desmond has chosen to keep him company on his own knowing the risks.

What nearly bribes them into joining the fire-gathering is Anne’s mellifluous voice, which Altair is sure Desmond would have liked to listen to had he not been preoccupied by Altair’s eerie silence.

Anne seems to have usurped the position of the story-teller tonight. She sits at the head of the circle with Talia cradled in her arms and nursing drowsily on her breast. The rest of children aren’t far away from sleep, but they’ve gathered to appreciate bedtime stories with the fading leftovers of energy that haven’t been sapped by play. Some time they spend debating passionately what tale they want to hear, laughter peals through flames of fire, and falls still. They finally settle on the question of how Talia came to be, of who the missing father is.

Out of the corner of his eye, Altair catches Desmond shifting to lend his ear to the tale. Altair doesn’t blame him; he, too, had had occasional thoughts of curiosity regarding this subject. He knows there’s only two possibilities: Talia’s biological father is a man, or a certain goddess.

“She has no father,” Anne begins in the exaggerated tone of someone who is starting a fairy-tale, “She has… _three mothers_.”

Altair isn’t surprised. He likes to think he’d almost felt something divine in the child while holding it.

“ _Masekha_?!” A handful of honest, curious, joyous gasps break the suspense. Even Desmond turns his head halfway to look again at the alleged child of a goddess. Latched onto a human breast it looks no different than any other child, yet if Anne had indeed been seduced by [Masekha](http://the-king-of-novices.tumblr.com/post/106253964456/live-forever-or-die-trying-the-pantheon-510), the child is a rarity.

“She chooses night to seduce women. She comes in summer, when she can fit through open windows. She visits after harvesting [her sister](http://the-king-of-novices.tumblr.com/post/105887755561/live-forever-or-die-trying-the-pantheon-410)’s tears from the sea into a moon, after she collects its shine into her lantern and gallops through the city until her horse’s white coat turns black and its hooves grow thin, after she’s brought moonlight into every nook and cranny of the city…”

“She came through your window?”

“She did.”

“How does she look?”

“Like Mary.”

Another peal of giggles flutters around before the young audience settles, the warm kernels in their bellies and Anne’s story continue keeping a sated silence around the fire.

“She disguises herself when she seduces taken women. They never know it’s a goddess…” Anne trails off with a vaguely bashful smile that won’t leave her lips.

Two women, given a family by a lustful goddess—the only god besides [Nokem ](http://the-king-of-novices.tumblr.com/post/104486337526/live-forever-or-die-trying-the-pantheon-110)and [Gdila ](http://the-king-of-novices.tumblr.com/post/104486350666/live-forever-or-die-trying-the-pantheon-210)cunning enough to make her own children with mortal women around the city. Even if Nokem knew (and he inevitably does) he would forgive her slyness, for he is the one who’s made her a goddess, and she’s the only one Nokem shared his cloak with.

Altair had heard of Masekha impregnating women married to women, both wives at once on rarest occasions. As a child he had heard what all children hear—the patter of hooves hitting cobblestones while Masekha gallops about the city at night with moon in hand.

Altai wonders if Malik had heard the gallop of Masekha’s horse on the night when Talia was conceived.

This last thought gives him more fodder for misery.

As an orphan, all Altair had wanted was to have a family that transcends the ties to fellow orphans and priests that had cared for them; life chose to not grant him that. When he left the orphanage all he had wanted was to be a warrior of his city; life decided to toss him into some foreign land to fight for years. Now that he has returned, what he wants is a marriage, the whisper of a family; life still does not cooperate, after all this time. Life drops the balls where he doesn’t want to play them.

Before Altair knows it, his wine-dulled brain is dismembering every piece of his odd marriage.

The fantasy of it was what kept him afloat throughout the war. Now that reality intrudes he feels like he has no cognitive place to hold the possibility of Malik abandoning him. It’s destabilizing. This world isn’t safe. Not because of war, but because there is nothing he can depend on. He’d chosen Malik because he’d believed he can depend on that. None of his conceptions of how life should be appear to be true now. If someone as loyal as Malik can do this to him, then anything can happen. Anything. What does he do in a world where he’s not safe and putting up armor around his heart is not a solution? He doesn’t want to be bitter and distrustful, he just wants what he’d chosen. He wants this chance which he took years ago. _This_ marriage.

A boy barely past five, with hair as dark as Malik’s and locks of curliest hair, comes suddenly up to the table and, grinning toothlessly and shyly, holds out two slices of Malik’s freshly-baked bread to each warrior. He then skips off with a giggle and Desmond’s pat on his head.

The slices are wrapped into discarded leafy corn husks to defend their fingers from burn. Altair accepts his from Desmond’s own hand. He has doubts about this even before tasting the sweet-scented food.

He gives a sorrowful sigh that rattles inside his chest, then takes a bite of the steaming slice of bread.

Despite its modest appearance, the dough is jammed with something sugary, some sweet powder or honey, or some such addition that lends the bread sweetness.

It’s sweet and warm and bitter and cold. It sticks to his throat and won’t be washed down.

As though some protective membrane has been torn away, everything that he had not allow himself feel and show suddenly becomes exposed in a rupture. He has nothing left to hold it back, only this raw, terrible feeling of being denied family. He puts the slice down. Wipes the crumbs from table with a whisk of his hand. Leans forward holding his temples.

A moment passes before there’s tears dripping over the table like molten wax.

Desmond’s reaction is instantaneous and twofold. He shifts up to Altair to give his slumped back a heartfelt rub, and then he reaches for the jug of wine sitting in front of them. It rattles, sloshing its contents around as he yanks it away to confiscate the shared drink but Altair catches him in mid-pull and soon reclaims the jug.

“I want to drink tonight.” His voice is choked and flimsy. Weak.

“I’ve never seen you like this,“ Desmond says with his hand traveling back and forth across Altair’s back, as if to imprint a warmth there that Altair seems to need. This discreet offer to open up to him Altair decides to take at last, albeit reluctantly.

“Never cried in war… Never cried before the war…” Altair trails off, pressing the pads of his thumbs against his eyes, as if the moisture would retreat from this pressure alone. Desmond’s hand keeps mowing down the kinks in his shoulders, with something that is neither a compassionate stroking nor a friendly rub, but a unified, purposeful kneading of muscles.

“Well, you _did_ , that one time at the orphanage, after we lost our ol’ beaten leather ball inside that empty water-well,“ Desmond recollects with a whisper of humor in his voice.

Altair’s mouth arranges itself into a watery smile in honor of this mnemonic recollection; he honors the attempt, but Desmond’s humor escapes him, and his wet face finds refuge inside his palms. Desmond resumes a steady glide across his back and feels sorry for him and doesn’t poke Altair into talk.

“I don’t—...“ Altair severs his sentence after the false start, as though he’s not even sure whether he wants to talk about Malik, “I don’t know what to do... I don’t know... Nothing works. He won’t exchange words with me. Back and forth and back… Whatever I try to build he destroys. I don’t know what to do, or say: I try to give him space, I try to corner him—“

“What have you done?“ Desmond butts in with a sense of dread. He wouldn’t put it past Altair to resort to less-than-peaceful solutions.   

“I didn’t hurt him,” Altair murmurs in a stumpy tone, upset by Desmond’s tacit accusation, before he’s upset with himself instead.

And then, inspired by this upset, Altair begins to do what he’s never done before: he begins to deconstruct his anger, rather than suppressing it. And by deconstructing it finds that his anger isn’t constructive, since his anger doesn’t do anything except make him feel bad. He oils the neglected cogs inside his head and sets them into motion to realize that the same anger that had made him face enemies boldly is the same anger that makes him stupid.

Anger makes a warrior stupid. Because anger makes a warrior bold, and boldness on the battlefield is beneficial. Altair had been consulting anger until it’d turned into a habit. Some of the ways he’s treated Malik are the relic of his habits. It hasn’t crossed Altair’s mind until now to detach in the ways alcohol makes him detach to look at his habits as something incongruous within his surroundings, something outlandish that’s suited only for a battlefield. His angry response isn’t _him_. It’s his habit. His fight-or-flight response. The only language he’s known for years.

Altair hopes he’s not too generous whilst giving himself a verdict: he hadn’t allowed his body to do the thinking for him this morning because it’d been his decision, but because the war has made him so. He hadn’t accepted refusal because if you’re refused first time, you’ll be refused forever. Because anger is a good substitution for fear.

Because if Malik rejects him now he will keep rejecting him and Altair will never have the time to stitch up a marriage between them.

Discouraged by Altair’s lack of response, Desmond’s hand shimmies away from his shoulder after a while. There’s more Altair wants to lift off his shoulders than mere kinks, more he wants to say, but he consults his drink first before consulting his brain.

“I don’t care ‘bout the war,” Altair starts, his heavy tongue grappling with the words, “I don’t _care_ ‘bout _before_ … Don’t want the spoils and coin, or the damn house—that’s not why I fought. I just wanted what we never had, Desmond. A fucking family. A husband. I thought I was heading somewhere…”

He had though he’s losing Malik as the result of overconfidence, only to realize he never had him to begin with.

“If he makes you so unhappy, why don’t you let him go, brother?“

Altair knitted his brows in response to this question and his face answered without so much as uttering a sound.

“I’d rather unman myself.“

“Then, you’re hurting yourself either way.“

Altair isn’t stupid. The desire to save or protect someone is, in the end, your feeling alone. Nothing more than self-satisfaction.

Releasing Malik means that he’s fought to protect nothing.

“How do you know he doesn’t return your affection?”

“How do you know something’s beating inside your chest?” Altair asks back, leaning into his hands again after he loses a battle against the pressure of tears which he’s managed to restrain until now. Desmond’s hand is on him again. This time petting through the hair above his nape.

“Some days there’s nothing inside.”

 

 

* * *

 

 

“Leonardo, he is _crying_...”

A heartbeat later Leonardo slots himself next to Salai to peer through the window overlooking the courtyard. He inspects the massive table, the two hunched figures isolated from the group around the fire, then heaves the prolonged sigh of someone who is coerced into splitting his sympathies between two people who are hurting each other.

“Fetch me my cloak,” Leonardo instructs, a wrinkle of worry sitting by his left eyebrow.

“You’re going all the way up there?”

“He’s been away long enough.”

 

 

* * *

 

 

It’s been a while since [Masekha](http://66.media.tumblr.com/2b01ba681f6c1cd1ea717de4afeb666e/tumblr_inline_nh7ir9JBqS1s92bgb.png) galloped through the night.

The city is moon-soaked and still—it sleeps.

Except for two brace of city guards and few wandering night artists in search of something to get their charcoals moving, no one else happens to cross Leonardo’s path across the city, until he is, at last, at the foot of [Hiba](http://67.media.tumblr.com/e030a03b42ab3ff338d19918cda87fde/tumblr_inline_nghj2fV5rD1s92bgb.png)’s sacred mountain.

From here on, the path leads only uphill.

The gateway is marked by a lineup of sticks aligned along the rim of the path, each slanted enough that the average adult can reach for their apex to pluck out a blazing torch. The torches are lit by the city guards and fitted inside metal brackets at nightfall, then looked after throughout the night, until dawn.

There are nine torches.

No more, no less. For no more than nine people at a time are allowed into the forest.

All nine sticks along the path are hosting a burning torch.

Meaning that Malik did not take any.

He wandered off into the darkness with no aid, and alone.

Leonardo reaches for a torch, lifts it from the bracket with ease, and then nearly drops it—a beastly howl leaps at him from the very peaks of the mountain; it rolls down the hilly slopes like lava and shrouds the hill and the human-inhabited belt round its foot like a veil of sound.

He takes a second torch. Though it’s been Malik’s intention to mask his presence, though there’s rarely more than nine people headed for the forest on the same night, Leonardo knows that tampering with the torches is wrong. Failure to announce your presence in the forest by not taking a torch is sacrilege.

He moves ahead then, a torch in each hand.

His climb is long and noiseless. The city below grows smaller with each new winding of the path. He ascends at a measured pace—a mere speck of moving light when seen from the city below—along the terraced, tessellated pavement coiling up the steep path like a colossal snake resting along the slanting slope of the hill. The path is a monotonous mosaic-like pavement until it expires into gravel at the peak, and the gravel continues for a handful of steps before it, too, marries into earth and fades off into grassy divots at the mouth of the sacred forest—a point from which the dark city lies at Leonardo’s feet like a scale model.

There’s only one spot in this sacred forest that’s most sacred to Malik.

Leonardo enters, obeying the only marked trail; there’s a distance he needs to cross before he must stray off it. The trail looks like a bridle path, a trodden track felted with fallen leaves and caressed by floppy ferns growing along its blurred border. In the distance is the dark background of the forest’s depths, barely a light. Above, a gauzy haze of moonshine is peeking through, powdering the path with dotty lights where canopy is thick, then projecting in vaporous shafts between the dark boles of foliage-stripped trees and drenching exposed patches of the trail in moonlight, dripping the light onto the pendulous ferns. The rest is darkness. The rest is the odor of what the ocean’s salt can barely penetrate: parched pines, moist earth, dry leaves, damp moss.

Leonardo’s ears strain for sounds of beasts and find nothing, plunging instead into an acoustic mirage where silence lends boom to the tiniest sounds, where he can’t distinguish his heartbeat from the drone, the clangor, the crescendo of the forest. The crickets chirp in shrubbery, the birds in trees. The torches hiss in his hold. A mourning dove warbles a sorrowful tune amid the leafy rustle of canopy that’s stroked by a wayward breeze. A skimpy rodent dashes through a shadowed branch above. The faint swish of his steps across the carpet of dried leaves barely upsets this dulcet hum of the forest.

The trail finally emerges into the clear, olive-green turf of a great field unmowed by time, moon-tinted by the pale shine that’s galloping away and tossing its silvery manes across this luscious-green which undulates slowly like a tidal wave before it crashes into a deep, vast lake.

Though the marked path has ended, Leonardo knows where to head next.

He knows, yet he comes to a stand in contemplation of the beauty as a sudden breeze wrinkles the large luminous surface of the lake as if it were a puddle and not a large expanse of water silver-tooled by the reflection of the moon’s fluorescent light.

He follows the breeze until it’s reached the skyline where the hill’s precipice meets the dark ocean in the distance and the darker sky powdered with the pollen of the starry night, and it’s there, at the rim of the lake, where Leonardo sees the shadowy outline of a wolf.

Leonardo’s pulse picks up for a moment, then falls.

He knows who they are. He’s seen them before. It might even be that this is the one whose howl had greeted him at the foot of the hill.

The wolf is one of [Ya’ar](http://the-king-of-novices.tumblr.com/post/114871631011/live-forever-or-die-trying-the-pantheon-610)’s  wandering companions.

The story goes that the beasts of the sacred forest have never harmed a human who hasn’t harmed the forest. Leonardo is at ease, for his intentions aren’t malicious.

The rumor goes that the beasts never descend into the city, never walk among the citizens, never leave the forest atop the hill. No benign visitor had ever been killed by a bear, no citizen attacked by a wolf within the city, no cattle harmed by wild cats, no poultry stolen by a fox.

The tale goes that the beasts sleep by day while [Hiba](http://67.media.tumblr.com/e030a03b42ab3ff338d19918cda87fde/tumblr_inline_nghj2fV5rD1s92bgb.png)’s eye watches over the city, and by night are cared for by Ya’ar who retreats into the ancient forest at nightfall.

Leonardo trusts [Ya’ar](http://67.media.tumblr.com/8729b273ae12ba52cfd238565bd90b4b/tumblr_inline_nlxwm2japo1s92bgb_1280.png) to protect him like Malik trusts [Nokem](http://65.media.tumblr.com/720dbadc20345b1f8a07c9bad46e71f3/tumblr_inline_ng5si0atko1s92bgb.png) to protect him.

The wolf continues to hold him under its scrutiny for a moment longer.

Leonardo lowers his torches then, bends his neck to hang his head low. To bow before Ya’ar’s sacred realm and its beasts and make his intentions known. He keeps still, counts nine breaths, fears nothing, and when he next lifts his head—the wolf is gone.

Without stalling any further, he turns left and presses ahead through the grassy field, across a road not traversed by a forest path. Across a trail paved by no feet, other than, perhaps, Malik’s.

The path at first skirts the lake, then penetrates the forest anew to span a smaller stretch of the woods that ends in a small clearing.

There, on the clearing, Leonardo glances ahead at his last stop.

A gentle mound on a bluff and atop it—a small dark lump prostrated on the ground, dwarfed by distance.

Leonardo bisects the clearing at a saunter before he clambers up along the violet dirt of the mound which ends only steps ahead, abruptly, in the form of a rocky outcropping and tumbles into a chasm so abysmal and appalling that the stoniest heart would palpitate at the merest peek downhill. 

It’s here where Malik had chosen Kadar’s grave should be.

Here, where Malik had picked Kadar’s small bones from Leonardo’s little satchel and planted them into the grave along with his sobs. Here, where Malik chooses to sleep soundly under a soundless [water-oak](http://img1.coastalliving.timeinc.net/sites/default/files/image/2013/04/trees-by-the-sea/live-oak-0413-l.jpg) whose bulging roots and thick trunk have been conquered by patches of moss flashing their heavenly emerald, whose low-hanging branches have been equally conquered by leafy vines spanning their knobbly length like a coat of mossy fur.

Malik’s feet wear no sandals.

He sleeps atop the very grave, cocooned inside his black cloak and sheltered beneath the moon-soaked canopy of [water-oaks](http://img1.coastalliving.timeinc.net/sites/default/files/image/2013/04/trees-by-the-sea/live-oak-0413-l.jpg).

The resonant silence of the place is disturbed by the crunch of a spidery twig as Leonardo crouches down, putting a knee into the ground for balance. He doffs his torches by stabbing the staves into the ground. Bending over the grave, Leonard rubs fleetingly across Malik’s cheek with the knuckles of his hand before carding his fingers through the unruly hair behind his temple.

“Malik,” he calls, stroking the cold softness of his temple with the back of his finger.

Gradually, as though through a dissolving meditation, he begins to stir from sleep.

Malik wakes up with his head cradled in the lap of a [faceless god](http://the-king-of-novices.tumblr.com/post/119950551366/god-zikaron-patron-of-death-prophecies) and his hair petted by his hand of memories, his temple caressed by a mortal man.

He blinks up and finds that Leonardo has fixed his mild gaze on him, but for an instant he hovers within that half-conscious moment where men possess what they’ve long lost and see what they long to forget, and he jolts himself from the feeling of having Kadar by mimicking what Leonardo is doing and petting the earth that covers his brother’s bones.

He had dreamed of Kadar sitting at the other end of his big harp (long turned into charcoal) and has woken with the feeling of still having a brother, and family.

He doesn’t blame Leonardo for waking him. It’s [Zikaron](http://the-king-of-novices.tumblr.com/post/119950551366/god-zikaron-patron-of-death-prophecies) who had teased him into thinking that he’s returned to Malik something long buried.

Sleep is the temporary death of the living.

Moments during which they are visited by Zikaron and made to believe what they wouldn’t dare in the land of the living.

“Malik?”

He gives no response, nor does he rise from the grave, as though some worries are keeping him chained to the ground.

“Give me insight into your thoughts.”

“I can’t kill him,” Malik whispers, copiously and dejectedly; the draft of his breath upsets the stillness of a tuft of grass atop the grave.

“Why not?”

“If I do, I will be killed. I won’t get to kill Abbas.”

“Is that all that keeps you from death?”

Worry begins to float away from Malik’s face to make space for something else. He finds himself suddenly ashamed to the point of pain, of horror that Leonardo might finally _not_ understand him.

“You know it pains me to cause sorrow to friends, but it’s in my blood to fight and die for justice.”

“That’s not what I meant,” Leonardo butts in tonelessly, dragging his knuckle across Malik’s temple to assure him that he still knows that Malik has been living his life to die for his cause.

“There’s sentiments that transcend friendship that can give reasons to live…” he trails off, nudging the implication of Altair closer to him, just to channel the idea through Malik’s mind.

Malik’s eyes flash up at him hotly, far more ferociously than the wolf’s Leonardo had stumbled upon earlier. He’s livid at the suggestion of Altair.

“Don’t speak of that. Not in this place,” Malik hisses through a gnashing of teeth. His hand splays over the grave, protectively, petting the earth.

Malik is blind to the irony of his shielding this grave from the mention of Altair, since it was through Altair’s kindhearted intervention that Leonardo and Malik were even able to locate and extract Kadar’s remains from the volcano top.

Bent on including Altair but straying from the topic of marriage, Leonardo changes his tactics.

“Have you not told me that Altair promised to kill Abbas himself?”

“He promised he would but… If I kill Al Mualim, he won’t do it.” He sounds certain. It’s what he’s decided for himself without consulting the people involved.

Leonardo won’t reprimand him for this. Having unverified beliefs could in this case prolong Malik’s life, and Leonardo wants to prolong it until Malik no longer feels like the sacrificial lamb of a cause.

“You don’t forgive well. Why is that?”

“Because I’m loyal.”

“Loyal to your suffering?”

In this silence that follows, Leonardo knows the next words will also be his.

Despite Malik’s capricious nature, his frequent outbursts of more-or-less justified fury, his sarcasm, sullenness, and incomprehension, Leonardo has always pitied his silences the most. For silences are where Malik feels most confused and vulnerable.

“You know what I think?” Leonardo starts and doesn’t expect anything but silence, “You are ungrateful. A person who cultivates gratitude sees enough of the good in their life to be able to hold some of the bad.”

He allows Malik a respite, a chance to brood over his words for a moment.

“I _am_ grateful,” Malik whispers out at last, unconvincingly.

“What kindness was offered today that you’ve taken for granted? Have you acknowledged it?”

For an instance Malik suspects that Leonardo is trying to coerce him to consider Altair again, but before he can manage to steer himself into the direction of anger, Leonardo covers Malik’s cold hand with his warm one (Altair’s is warmer, though he regrets this thought) to make him recognize that Leonardo refers, primarily, to himself. It takes him a short while to realize the kindness that is Leonardo, even quicker to feel shame for having overlooked it, but by far the quickest to appreciate him in ways he’s forgot to do.

Encouraged by the shield of warmth, Malik twists his wrist, flips his hand up, unfolds his fingers to allow Leonardo’s to fall through the gaps, then captures them between his own. Regardless of how long he’s been convincing himself that Leonardo had made peace with it, Leonardo is afraid of Malik’s death. It’s a fear that shows as Leonardo presses further down to flatten his palm against Malik’s where a gap has built naturally, hoping that Malik will be able to feel his pulse and maybe even instill the stillness of his heart into Malik’s own to mellow his desire for revenge. 

The world is cruel; but the world is also rich and loving and nourishing. Malik doesn’t need to delve too deep into his wound as much as place it into the context.

“It’s time to head home,” Leonardo insists, watching Malik pet the grave with the hand that isn’t given to him, “Kadar has had you long enough. You need to leave him to rest. Let Zikaron return him home.“

“Here is his home,” Malik lifts his arm by the elbow to touch an area above his heart. His cheek grazes the naked ground instead of a petting hand as he turns to kiss the grave, to whisper Kadar goodnights and farewells. Leonardo imprints a kiss at the back of his own free hand, then lays it across Malik’s splayed one to kiss Kadar too.

“I don’t want to go home,” Malik says when Leonardo’s attempt to urge him up fails repeatedly.

“You can sleep in my bed.“

This time, he is more susceptible to Leonardo’s pull as he lifts him off ground.

And Malik is a child again, and it’s like many years ago.

Malik’s flaws and weaknesses are extensive. But his deepest flaw is that he turns his strengths into weaknesses.  

What Leonardo knows is that Malik is the most loyal person he knows. What Malik doesn’t is that it is not necessary to be loyal to his suffering.    

What Leonardo also knows is that Malik is so loyal to his suffering that it has become what _defines_ him.

 

 

* * *

 

 

They’re greeted by the smell of snuffed fire and an odor of despair emanating from the pair hunched over the massive table.

Malik had not expected to find Altair in the courtyard at this hour, let alone piss-drunk.

He’d expected that by the time he returns, everyone will have dispersed, and so had Leonardo. Malik hopes that the murmur of the warriors’ own voices will mask whatever noise their steps might carry across the courtyard when they dart for the studio, but, as they are exiting the winding tunnel which expires steps away from Leonardo’s doorstep, the dark flash of Malik’s cloak catches Altair’s eye.

They’re spotted by Altair a mere stride away from Malik’s intended hideaway.

They all but barge into the studio.

“Bolt the door, he’ll come after me,” Malik has scarcely uttered this when his attempt of escape starts crashing to pieces.

Altair lurches past the doorstep, banging the door into the wall before leaning against the doorframe spaciously, making it apparent just how many cups he’s drained. His wine-stained white shirt is open-necked and generously undone to the point of failing to fulfill its function and making the man look ragged. He looks haggard, fatigued, invaded by concern and horrors of a kind Malik is unaware of, but with fingers of joy clutching at his worry-tattered face. A joy at seeing Malik healthy and breathing in front of him; at seeing the black, permanently tousled hair peeking from his black hood; at seeing the eyes that blend glint and blackness so well. A joy at seeing Malik’s full-blown, elemental, well-groomed beauty of a scowl.

Altair is fond of Malik’s mild-mannered scowls more than he is of solitude.

He’s unused to solitude. He’s unused to rejection. Malik will hurt him. Malik is going to cause him pain. And knowing this is still not a deal-breaker, and he feels on the stupid end of this marriage bargain for feeling so.

“Malik,” he says because he needs to hear the name, then pushes off the doorframe awkwardly, “Malik, come home.”

He takes an impotent step forward but Malik’s darkened face already has a restraining hand on him.

Altair waits until the stifling room has swelled with tension to the point of bursting, then chances another step forward.

Malik recoils.

The flying folds of his dazzling black raiment for an instance whirl, suspended, in the air when Malik careens around Leonardo in a sharp curve, as though to seek protection behind Leonardo’s back, as though he knows much of how close Altair had come to violence this morning, and little of how Altair had vowed to himself to never revert to violence again.

Altair stares at Leonardo as though he’s to blame for Malik’s turning the blond into his breathing wall. Leonardo tugs his shoulders up into an apologetic shrug, trying to appear as unbiased as physically possible.

Altair glances downward with fingers clutching at his rumpled breeches and a focused furrow between his brows as he gives his head a shake, almost as if he wants the words inside his skull to rattle into place, and then—probably for the first time in his life—the warrior begins a cautious descent.

The wooden floor beneath him grunts and falls still as he steadies himself.

It’s almost easy to kneel like a dog in front of them while he’s imbibed with wine, half-tethered to hope and half-untethered from sanity.

“Malik,” his voice shimmers again, “I… wanted to look for you everywhere—in the city…”

Malik chooses to look at him; he peers over Leonardo’s shoulder with his smoky-dark eyes, and nothing past this. Altair’s luck does not hold.

“Here’s a man who would cross the city to find me and he can barely cross from one table to another,“ Malik throws the ridicule from behind Leonardo’s back. It’s unsure whether Malik wants to amuse himself, or Leonardo, or to simply stab the knife of humiliation deeper into Altair’s flesh.

Altair doesn’t rise, doesn’t start a judicial inquiry about Malik’s previous whereabouts, doesn’t retort in any way. To Leonardo who is the only one watching him now he looks like a man debating himself.

There’s still confidence in him. When he barged through to beg for Malik’s return, Altair came with a bagful of provision with him: patience, affection, drunkenness, and humility as his trump card.

It’s this precious cargo that softens his every movement as he suddenly stoops his head and fits his palms into a flat clasp in front of him, glues the joined thumbs to his forehead, bows his back to hunch over his own knees to touch his forehead to the ground and, before his forehead can trap his clasped hands against the floor, he splays them open facing upward, and, finally, finds purchase for his right elbow to lift his arm up without so much as budging the rest of his body.

The ultimate symbol of submission.

A prostration executed so neatly by a wine-softened man could only be fueled by a great despair.

“Malik, please come home,” Altair begs, muffled by the floor, in a submissive tone that behooves no warrior.

He is concerned, thought he gauzy haze of tipsiness, not so much about the affront itself (a formal act of prostration doesn’t befit a man of his reputation) but about the stupidity of it, the truth that even _this_ Malik might shrug off as mere trifle.

Oblivious to the sight, Malik is quiescent behind Leonardo’s back.

As soon as Leonardo’s own shock wears off, he sidesteps, clearing the way for Malik’s viewing. This leaves Malik exposed to the display. Without properly looking at Malik, Leonardo’s hand locates his cloaked back, thrusting him onward until he stumbles in the very front of Altair.

No human being with a shred of heart would remain untouched by Altair’s gesture, this prostration that could be confused for an act of worship were it not an act of submission to another human being.

For a few moments Malik can’t curb his astonishment and stands muted by this gesture of supplication and ultimate surrender to humility which Altair possessed so little of when he arrived.  

The very posture of supplication defaces his pride as a warrior, the fearsome stance he usually exudes with his presence alone.

He’s reduced to _nothing_.

“I know… between our marriage and us stands pride so here... I discard my pride. Please return home, Malik. I want to see an end to this feud…”

He awaits Malik’s touch. The simplest brush against Altair’s presented palm would suffice to acknowledge his supplication and grant his wish in exchange for his submission.

Far more captivating than his subservient posture is the hopeful way in which Altair is offering his unfolded hand upwards for Malik’s acceptance. The way a tremble grazes his callus-ridden palm while he keeps it splayed at its limits, to hasten sympathy.

He’s hanging on Malik’s mercy by his fingernails.

“Leave,” Malik orders with a hint of growl in his peppery tone, “I don’t want to look at you.”

Altair’s body doesn’t budge at first; his head still hangs low, touching the ground, and Malik imagines he can feel the roiling tide of anguish oozing from Altair.

He towers over the prostrated warrior, indulging himself heavily into enjoying Altair’s despair.

Below, Altair finally shifts, giving Malik a sidelong flash of his tawny eye. His eyes glisten like wet leaves. His chest feels tight; it’s constricting. He scrambles off the floor, his face distorted by the blast of Malik’s rejection and the strain of keeping silent. 

Altair is allowed to have the last word.

He slinks off noiselessly instead, as though some stout rope has got a hold of his mouth and plugged his throat.

Two bad silences follow.

First during Altair’s retreat as he emigrates to the courtyard again, and from there to who knows where.

Then, during Leonardo’s deciphering of what Malik has just done.

There’s more to Malik’s convoluted reaction than he lets on. Altair wouldn’t be able to recognize this even if he were completely sober, but Leonardo is privy to more than just Malik’s unusual body language.

Malik’s body language is the bones, his silence the _meat_ of his reaction. In his silence hides the genuine reaction to Altair’s gesture of supplication. What hides is something voluptuous, a debauch more than a relief. It’s almost as if Malik looks ready to follow after Altair and confess something he himself is unaware of.

“You care…”

“What?” Malik puffs out a little brusquely.

“You care,” Leonardo concludes. He scrutinizes Malik judiciously, his pale eyebrows knitting a darkening cloud of reproach across his forehead.

“I taught you to be mindful, Malik.”

“I can’t bring the practice of mindfulness into everything that happens during my day.”

“Perhaps instead of carving time from your day to be mindful, you could bring your day _into_ your practice. Where you _are_ is your place of practice. And what’s the best way to be mindful, Malik?”

“To know my intention before I act,” he murmurs, visibly flustered.

“So what was your intention when you rejected your husband’s invitation?”

Leonardo’s expected a different answer.

He’s _expected_ an answer.

When Malik gives none, the answer reveals itself to him on its own, confirms right away what Malik’s intention had been.    

“You care.”

“What?” Malik repeats helplessly, his attempt feels like a worn shield riddled with chinks and helpless against Leonardo’s persistence. 

“You care. You reject because you enjoy the attention he gives when he’s desperate, don’t you?”

Malik doesn’t honor the question with a response; not because Leonardo doesn’t deserve one, but because of the seething shame at being read so easily, so fluently.

Leonardo heaves a terse sigh, the hardest sigh he’s heaved today.

“You’ve had your reward then. You’ve seen him vulnerable. For this, you will return to him to pay with comfort.”

Malik’s jaw unlocks leaving his mouth open and his face frozen in rictus. He’s ready to argue, for the merest of moments, but then he falls still before managing to utter anything at all and he puckers his brow into the blackest scowl—a mousy way of expressing protest in the face of defeat.

He’s far from satisfied with Leonardo’s decision.

But Leonardo will let him stay for a few more hours on the promise that he’ll go back home. So he plants himself into the nearest sofa in blunt, stiff motions, willing to obey at the price of slight delay and anxious about what the rest of the night will bring, and tomorrow.

Leonardo marvels at the differences between the husbands. Altair loves without holding back. Malik doesn’t, because giving without holding back for him is fear-based. In this respect, Malik is far weaker than a prostrated Altair.

“Some humility would suit you, Malik,” Leonardo advises jokingly as he comes to stand before Malik to give his frowning cheek a pinch, “Think of all the ways you’re loved that you couldn’t possibly have caused.”

And saying this, Leonardo wanders off to tackle preparations for the night, leaving Malik to sit on his words and sofa. Malik’s mind _nearly_ bundles off to the question of how his body could have been the subject of such admiration when Altair’s own is far more handsome than his own. It hops off to the memory of his hand held reverently like the strongest weapon and fondest weakness, then reverts to the image of submission from before. No one has ever prostrated themselves to Malik in supplication. No man of Altair’s reputation had empowered him thus by extending a pleading hand up to him and depending on his mercy.

Leonardo fits a cup of tea into Malik’s hand and drops a folded piece of cloth into his lap.

“If you don’t learn to own your own bad behavior, you’ll become someone who can be mad even at dead people, Malik,” Leonardo chides affectionately.

It’s one of Salai’s spare nightshirts.

He swaps his clothes for the borrowed nightclothes while Leonardo is reading through a note that Salai had left, informing him that she’s visiting a lover. Leonardo goes on to revive the fire from embers and prepare the bed, all the while grumbling to himself to allay a trace of annoyance at Salai for using his absence to elope, about her new lovers, about foreigners.

Though Malik barely listens to a word he grumbles, the familiarity of his fatherly voice lulls Malik into a tranquil state, and he clings to the warm cup pleased that he is given another few hours of sanctuary.

He goes to bed with a cup of strong tea in his belly and a generous fire on his skin, nestled against Leonardo’s side and his nose grazing Leonardo’s shoulder where the man smells of wonderful pine, much like the pine-cones burning in the fireplace. The pine-cones are young, they still have sap in them and pop in the fire. They burn cheerfully, filling the air with faintly spicy smells on a background of lavender and leather.

“I expect you to return home before dawn,” Leonardo whispers, failing to inspire authority in his soft, mellow voice.

“Why don’t you tell him what’s upsetting you?” Leonardo questions rhetorically when he realizes that fishing for Malik’s response is bound to fail, “The man loves you. Is it, perhaps, because you feel that love means not having to spell everything out? Then you’re no better than an infant, Malik. An infant needs no words because the mother knows when it needs food and care.”

“You can choose to remain an infant, Malik. Or become the complex adult that we are and use your words to your advantage. You’re expecting him to work out this—“ the arm that’s not wound round Malik’s back unfolds to send its hand pointing at a complicated invention Leonardo had pulled from some remote corner of the studio,”—simply by looking at its appearance. Give him the honor of an explanation of who you are.”

Malik remains curiously silent during this bedtime lecture, with an ear now pinned to Leonardo’s chest, as if listening in on the man’s slowing breathing and waiting for sleep to sedate him.

Leonardo can’t be fooled by Malik’s silence.

Silence doesn't lend Malik the strength he wishes to cloak himself into. It makes him look scared. Because in truth he feels like a defenseless infant in the hands of a husband who doesn’t know how to look after them.

“You’ve seen him: a big, strong man begging on his knees—” 

“It doesn’t matter,” Malik interrupts suddenly in a gruff voice.

Leonardo’s persistence has massaged a response out of him at last.

“Can’t yesterday be forgiven if he’s a different man today?”  

“Never.”

Malik’s head rises and falls in tandem with Leonardo’s sigh. The sigh alone corrals Malik into feeling guilt more than all Leonardo’s scolding.

“Then you’re still living in the past. The past still has you in prison, doesn’t it?”

Imprisoned by Leonardo’s gentle hold, Malik says nothing.

 

 

* * *

 

 

Malik unprisons himself from Leonardo’s embrace long after midnight and short before dawn, during the hour that still belongs to [Masekha](http://66.media.tumblr.com/2b01ba681f6c1cd1ea717de4afeb666e/tumblr_inline_nh7ir9JBqS1s92bgb.png).

The echo of Leonardo’s scolding tintinnabulates inside his head like bells as he creeps up the tunnel-stairs, and into his noiseless home.

In his bedroom, on the bed that had until recently been occupied by none other than Malik himself, are two men. Both sound-asleep and equally unaware of his arrival.

A nasal sigh of mild annoyance tears from his chest.

With all the bed linen usurped, he has to produce a new bed-cover, has to pluck a pillow from the sofa. Though the sofa is spacious and unoccupied, the thought of spending the rest of his sleep here never crosses his mind.

He walks up to his bed and fits himself into the strip of space at the left side of Desmond, who conveniently, though unconsciously, acts as the breathing barrier between him and Altair.

He has sensed that something extraordinary will happen at home. Finding two men in his bed is not what he’d imagined.

 

* * *

 

 

When Malik wakes next, some morning light has filtered into the bedroom and there’s an arm right around his middle.

The freeze that traverses his body in the form of shock lasts longer than Malik would like to admit. When he is finally able, he rolls back to shove the culprit away, shouldering the man away enough to glimpse at his face and find—Desmond.

He blinks; his anger disperses but confusion soars instead.

“I was about to hit you.“

“Why?“

“Thought you were Altair…“

Desmond issues a noncommittal sound and makes no effort to dislodge his arm which has managed, by some miracle, to remain loosely wound around Malik’s waist.

“Why are you here anyway?“ Malik says languidly, resuming his previous place heavy-eyed and raided by drowsiness again now that his alarm proved to be false and pointless.

“Babysitting Altair.“

What Desmond doesn’t say is that he does this whenever Altair is drunk, every time he _had_ been drunk abroad, because Altair had always feared that in his state of longing for a husband he might stray unintentionally and cheat in his drunken state.

“I’ve never had so many men in my bed before,“ Malik mutters as he privately appreciates the warmth oozing off Desmond’s front.

“Thank gods you hadn’t,“ Altair quips from the other side of bed.

He’s been awake, too. His voice is gravel, his sadness, if present, is masked by faked drollness.

“Why are you still holding me?“ Malik asks, determined to ignore Altair’s presence.

“Altair told me to hold you because he can’t. Says he’s not allowed, so I should do it in his stead.“

“What makes you so sure that I won’t hit you too?“

“You haven’t... so far…“ Desmond trails off.

“Let go,“ Malik orders after the ensuing gap in conversation.

Desmond actually does. The arm around his waist retracts before the warrior rolls off onto his back obediently.

“That definitely wasn’t forwarded from Altair.“

“Why do you say so?“ Desmond asks, genuinely curious.

“He doesn’t let go when I tell him to.“

“ _Oh_. _That’s_ low—“

“Fuck you,” the accused cuts in, muttering from the less populated side of the bed.

Malik wants to laugh. The urge tickles at the back of his throat and simmers in his belly. And when he thinks he’s losing the battle Desmond rolls up to him again and winds his arm around his waist tighter than before, hushing the laughter inside him. His warmth is welcome and his touch pleasant, and Malik makes an effort to not compare it to Altair’s which he feels in a more visceral and thrilling way.

“Desmond. You’re doing it again,“ Malik states and feels stupid for having to point out the obvious.

“This is from myself.“

“Oh,” he utters elegantly, and adds “Alright.“

“ _Hey_!“ Altair protests this quick concession.

Desmond chuckles kindly and the sound of it is so infections that Malik borrows from the laugh and chuckles along without fighting the urge this time.  

Altair lets go of a sigh and boldly proclaims:

“I’m jealous.”

“We know,“ Desmond throws back at him before he lowers his voice somewhat into a sham whisper that’s ostensibly meant for Malik but loud enough for Altair to hear, “He knows I fancy ladies. He knows I’m seeing someone. He knows I’m his best friend and would never touch you, and yet he finds it in himself to be jealous.”

“Sounds like him.“

No sooner had Malik joined in the joke, Altair rises from the bed in haste, bursting the bubble of humor whose scapegoat he has turned out to be. He marches off, leaving the bedroom, but in the flash of a moment before he’s hidden from sight by the wall, Malik catches what he couldn’t see from the wall that had been Desmond: Altair’s face, unshaven and creased from a sleepless night, hollowed by sorrow.

Malik has wondered if he’d been drunk enough to forget what happened at Leonardo’s yesterday, but his face remembers it well. This odd moment of carefree humor between the three of them has been but a breath of relief during Altair’s prolonged misery, too obscenely meaningless to mean anything real to him.

Though Desmond means to be a peacemaker, though the affection he imbues into his hug while holding Malik is genuine, though the tightening of his arm around Malik is something he himself wants and feels Malik will appreciate, his ensuing words only add to Malik’s already existing stab of guilt, deepening it.

“Try to be gentler with him. He’s hard on the outside but inside he suffers,“ Desmond whispers into his ear, and this time the whisper intended for Malik only.

Having imparted this important advice, Desmond detaches, making sure to compensate the loss heat for a bed-cover, and then also deserts the bed leaving Malik sufficiently tucked in.

Malik falls asleep with difficulty, with the sounds of Altair complaining of headache in the background.

 

 

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> tfw you’re having Malik cuddled at every step but none of the cuddles come from the hubby...
> 
> I just realized that there’s an anachronism in the way Altair and Malik are feeling life: Altair is ignoring his past (though he _shouldn’t_ ) and he’s obsessed with his future, while Malik is ignoring his future (though he _shouldn’t_ ) and he’s obsessed with his past, and they’re kinda brushing each other the wrong way on their conflicting paths. There’s a whole lotta porridge these two gotta eat before they can call themselves husbands.
> 
> **Anyway, next chapter is packed with action and it should come sooner, but meanwhile drop me your thoughts <3 **


	13. Chapter 11

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> If anyone's in Greece we could meet up, spending my holidays there <3 On a somewhat related note, I’ve been thinking of you guys in the past couple days, and cheesiness and all aside, I just feel like saying a genuine thanks to every person still reading this story--you’re a treasure.
> 
> Here's [the map](https://prezi.com/gip9vov8u-e1/the-city-of-nine/) of the city again, it might help visualize some of the stuff. I'll probably draw sketches of the temple forum next time.
> 
> ~~this was supposed to be updated last week i'm cry~~

 

 

* * *

 

 

There’s as many people as Altair expects, but more than he remembers.

The people that have gathered are most of the city-state. A whole island congregated at one spot. It’s a testimony to Al Mualim’s heralds who have ensured that the news of the general assembly had spread into every nook and cranny of the city. The hour of the forest is nigh—the moment in time when the sun emerges whole from behind the sacred forest atop Hiba’s hill. It’s almost up, barely touching its gilded underbelly to the forest canopy beneath it.

They are facing the temple, the temple faces the sacred hill.

Those who have arrived earlier now stand around the first of three massive podiums leading up to the temple, the rest is spilling from the boundaries of the forum—some clogging the main crossroads of the city at the end of the forum, some sidling up to the very pillars of Nokem’s theater that’s wedded to the back of Gdila’s temple, some wedged between the temple and the orphanage to the right.

Between the densely-peopled fountain and the elevated base of the temple, Altair stands mildly irritated by the swarm of people flanking him on each side. He stands there—in front of Leonardo and Ezio who did not want him there at present—battling the unnerving feeling of being boxed in by too many people at once (a feeling that seems to bother no one but him) by keeping an eye on Malik.

Malik has excluded himself from the group by skulking a few steps ahead where he’s found a suitable spot, recognizable by his glossy black hair and the tunic clasp on his shoulder that now and again winks in sunlight, perhaps the last rays of sunlight this season has to offer them.

Watching Malik gives him an odd feeling; odd enough that it mutes the discomfort of suffocating in a teeming crowd.

A homogeneous, velvety, monotonous feeling that wells up within the very pit of his belly, something akin to a simmering yearning to go ahead and invite himself closer to Malik; a sad little bud of a feeling that’s mown down by a recurring surge of discouragement and then stuck there like an inward-broken rib.

At a couple occasions, Altair is courted by the idea of approaching him while they wait for the assembly to commence. The only caveat is that Malik would not want him there.

They had but one, terse exchange that morning, they’d eaten breakfast together and made a quiet meal of it, with an awkward silence between them that Malik is so keen on fueling.

Toying with the idea of approaching Malik is nothing but false starts and reverie, until a hand plants itself against his back and starts deliberately pushing him ahead. When he turns around Leonardo is already halfway back to Ezio, but tipping his chin at Malik’s general direction to direct Altair to where he’s been pushing him. Leonardo is egging him onward. Altair has grown increasingly self-conscious about the propriety of his own decisions, but Leonardo, too, judges the moment appropriate and this lends him some confidence.

It’s silent inside Altair for the next few moments. Then he rolls in his head the idea that Leonardo has given him and he jostles his way to Malik, knocking shoulders with several people before he’s able to reach him.

Neither truly beside Malik nor entirely behind his back, he announces his presence boldly by splaying his hand across the small of Malik’s back with a generous pressure that would have leapt into the dodgy realm of possessiveness, had it not been so distinctively protective in its core.

Malik’s head turns sharply to asses him but he averts his stare rather quickly, points it ahead towards the temple, offers no response save for the tenseness of his body that’s embraced by Altair when he folds the arm completely around his waist. He’s gambling copiously and nervously. From the corner of his eye he watches Malik’s reaction warily, guardedly, ready to retreat from the territory he’s encroached if Malik shows the slightest sign of pushing him away.

Malik’s face doesn’t sour; he appears confused. His face is otherwise wiped clean of any expression.

Altair can only breathe. Keep his arm where it is and feel the patina of sweat gathering across his palm. Malik’s allowed himself to be embraced. When the barrier that he keeps between them thaws out like a block of butter, Altair carves himself more securely against Malik’s side and for an instance fears nothing. When his hand accumulates on courage, he lets it slink down to the front of Malik’s hip, with his thumb tucked idly into the low belt hanging off Malik’s hips.

Amidst the fidgety mass of people they stand no different than the regular couple.

Malik’s reaction is muted, as is his voice. He remains still, tied with no hands, held by Altair’s eyes, and the sweat on Altair’s palms is creeping into the folds of his tunic and its heat is warming his side in a manner he could learn to appreciate.

To Altair, Malik’s reaction is something novel. It’s nascent, it’s not just beginning but it’s not robust acceptance of him yet either. But it’s wonderful. Its lifespan is short and Malik’s awareness of him perishes at the first hint of movements up on the temple podium.

Malik’s attention shifts religiously ahead, to the stately, regal stream of people trickling down the stairs of the temple to settle at the first high podium that’s hugged by the crowd. A handful of priests, the rest Al Mualim’s flock.

Malik doesn’t know all their names. But their faces are burned into his skin like the memory of the Massacre.

He balls his fists, unwittingly, and doesn’t feel the soothing clasp of Altair’s hand against his hip.

It all happens in a ceremonious, calculated way, rehearsed to appear genuine and informal—an attempt lost to Malik’s eye. The group settles around the podium—priests and Al Mualim’s immediate company ringed and surrounded by bellicose mercenaries ready to jump at the whisper of a threat. The mercenaries are foreign. Malik doesn’t recognize them, but despises them immediately, more than Altair does. Malik assumes that the first and only speaker will be Al Mualim, but a herald steps forth first to open the assembly.

“Citizens! Rejoice, for you have lived to bear witness to the Prophecy! Rejoice on this auspicious day!”

Something in Malik’s chest turns ill. And he can’t breathe. And the crowd begins to squirm around him.

The people jam the streets to see their hero, like on the day when they witnessed an eagle beat its wings to fly over Al Mualim when he first spoke to the city upon return, faces peek from behind the giant columns lining the border of the forum, children stand on their toes perched atop the brim of the fountain at its center. Raised heads and inclined shoulders, and a motley of expressions. None of this Malik wants to see directed at the man he wants dead.

The herald announces Al Mualim stately and ornately but Al Mualim’s presence declaims itself as he takes the place, towering over the crowd gathered below him, for him. He lifts his hands in a grand, open gesture and a hush passes over the forum in a tide.

“’ _There are two saviors, most distant from each other: one who stands with common people and one born by gods, the last of his kind. Together they will restore the city and live forever’_! _"_ Al Mualim recites the famous words.

During the battle of gods, there were only three prophecies ever foretold by [Zikaron](http://the-king-of-novices.tumblr.com/post/119950551366/god-zikaron-patron-of-death-prophecies). One to Ga’ash, one to [Nokem](http://the-king-of-novices.tumblr.com/post/104486337526/live-forever-or-die-trying-the-pantheon-110), the last to humans who would inhabit the island.

How fitting that Al Mualim’s first words to a general assembly are the words of the god of death—his third and last prophecy, entrusted to humans.

“People of the City of Nine! The priests have deciphered the last prophecy. Our beloved city is in the hands of its saviors,“ he bellows, suddenly extending his arm to invite the noble companion ordained by the Prophecy, the one born by the gods, and a woman steps forth to stand as Al Mualim’s equal.

Malik has seen her before. It’s the one Desmond had approached at Malik’s own insistence. Headstrong face and crimson dress and hair that melts like gold when it merges with the sunlit air that quivers around it. A noblewoman Malik is learning to hate.

He’d believed that no noble would sink as low as to put on a show for Al Mualim’s purpose, to make the Prophecy appear valid. For the Prophecy requires one common man, which Al Mualim is, and one noble as his companion. Malik feels betrayed by a fellow noble. Not for the first time, but deeper than before.

Al Mualim has found himself a willing noble to play the role and the priests have declared them the saviors of the city.

Around Malik, the crowd has erupted into awe and a tenacious murmur of whispers. Many generations had to perish before the Prophecy could be fulfilled. To be alive during its time is to be both unlucky and lucky, for to be saved by the prophesized saviors is to have witnessed a decline of your city first. Every good is preceded by a bad. Malik has no doubts that the bad had already happened, but he has no doubts that Al Mualim is not the savior that the Prophecy had promised them.

What happens then quenches whatever hope there was in Malik.

The words, the show, the joined appearance of a noble and a self-professed savior of the city provoke an immediate response from the mercenaries up on the podium who start religiously dropping to their knees to hail the pair. This wave of devoted prostration triggers another; the first belt of people closest to temple stairs follow; soon the crowd spilled round the temple podium falls to this trick of mimicry and begins to kneel and prostrate itself in sweeping tides that continue on until they’ve reached the very outskirts of the mass.

Malik stands, and is the only one.

Altair is conflicted.

His proximity to Malik’s body makes his own descent to the ground all the more difficult and he pours himself into an inelegant crouch—one knee squared up, one brushing the milky gleam of the marble spanning the forum’s floor—bothered by how Malik will accept this gesture of obedience. How he will measure the man that is his husband if Altair rubs salt into his wound by yielding to Al Mualim.

But Malik’s rigid stance looks to Altair as a rare disconnect from everyone around and a singular focus ahead, on the man he wants dead; he acts entirely cut off from everything around, as if he wishes to possess his grief all by himself without tainting it by any foreign presence, without sharing it with any other soul.

With weaponless hands soldered into powerless fists and nostrils flared by empty anger, he has taken a firm stand as a gesture of civil disobedience at the most inconvenient of times—when the whole city has united in a rare awe and all with sword in hand are backing the man Malik has chosen to disobey.

Malik’s stubbornness won’t perish, Altair knows it.

Caught as he is in his graceless half-crouch, Altair does what he thinks wisest and lands a meaty smack against the back of Malik’s knees to upset his balance and encourage his body to tip backwards and stumble right into his lap. It’s not as elegant a move as he’d hoped but he arranges Malik into a less-than-comfortable impromptu sit on his bent legs after catching him and arrests his arms by the wrists to compress them against Malik’s own chest—more for the sake of keeping him firm in his lap than keeping Malik restrained. 

“What do you think you’re doing?!” Malik hisses at him askance, without an actual bodily struggle.

“Don’t draw attention to yourself,” he explains laconically, the proximity of Malik’s ear to his lips enough to soothe his voice into a whisper. Malik responds with the next nearest thing to sulking, which is a gnashing of teeth and averting his head with a hostile huff.

He doesn’t attempt to worm himself out of Altair’s lap; perhaps because he doesn’t trust himself to kneel outside Altair’s constrictive hold.

He chooses to glare ahead across the expanse of prostrated backs, he hates docilely, and mourns at seeing that the citizens are quick to obey and slowly turning into retinue without being aware of it.

Al Mualim has involved them emotionally and helped to persuade them by having them persuade themselves. Made himself a god by having them make him one. The marriage of people’s minds to this notion is the political funeral of their traditions.

“Citizens!” The noblewoman calls for attention and her voice is unadulterated and complete, as though she believes in what she speaks, “We are at a forked path: we can watch the city fall to chaos in the hands of our enemies. Or we can take the city into our hands and weed out the bad seeds that would oppose the Prophecy. To go against it is to go against the gods themselves and it is our _duty_ to keep another war away from our city!”

Lucy’s words had no sooner rang out when the mercenaries drag something out of the temple and down the stairs onto the first podium.

Altair feels the stir of Malik’s body; the jolt as the mercenaries plant their victim at the very front of the podium stairs for all to gaze at.

He can’t persuade his body to cooperate as Malik suddenly springs to his feet, but it matters little as the people are rising all around.

There’s an angry blotch making purple riot across the side of Rauf’s face.

This bruise on Rauf’s skin look as though he had been roughened up by Al Mualim’s men before being dragged here, but Altair knows that the bruises have been caused by his own hands, two days ago.

He’d contemplated going to the market to apologize to the blacksmith for the unwarranted punch, and to see the man again like this is beyond startling.

“This man has caused us grief! When our brave warriors fought in the war, he refused to craft weapons that protect our lives and yours! Refused to cooperate! Refused to lend his skills to the aid of those who fought and died to protect this city from those who’d enslave us!” Lucy halts there allowing the mercenaries to drag Rauf sideways, between two marble columns. It’s a rather anodyne speech, given the nature of the assembly. Four men then begin to bind two ropes around the two neighboring columns.

“All who do not obey disobey the gods! This blacksmith here will pay his many slights with his life! To be flogged and bound in public, exposed to the elements and left to perish of thirst and injury!”

Without a whipping post, the mercenaries improvise by suspending Rauf between the two marble columns, unshackling his tied hands only to string him up by the wrists between the columns, until his toes could barely graze the floor, his torso already bared.

Altair’s body at last propels him forward when Malik shoots out shouldering himself through the crowd to advance ahead. He doesn’t get to cross a significant distance. Altair won’t allow it.

The ill-conceived attempt at whatever rescue attempt Malik’s adrenaline-addled head has concocted ceases when Altair seizes him by the waist or shoulders or arm or whatever he manages to accomplish first in this beastly tangle of limbs, and he doesn’t drag them back to their previous spot that has now been claimed by others, but remains there struggling to keep Malik in place.

“Where are you _going_!?“ he snaps, fighting the onslaught of struggle against him, “They’re armed men against one weaponless boy, what do you think you’ll accomplish?” 

“They’ll _flog_ him, I _have_ to help him he’s my _friend_ and teacher—“

“I won’t allow it. You’ll invite trouble and help _no one_ ,” Altair reasons, giving Malik’s frame a hefty-and-pointless shake to aid this persuasion, but it’s his sane argument that skins the fervor off Malik and strips his body off resistance. For a moment, at least. And then:

“Would you hesitate if it were me up there?” Malik whispers up at him and his face is not glare and fury but pained helplessness. Altair’s face falls. In his grip, Malik’s body waits in anticipation of his response.

“That’s beside the point. Running up there _now_ is suicide—“

“So you’d do nothing if it were me?”

“I didn’t say that—“ Altair breaks off, realizing the futility of the course this exchange is taking. This hesitation Malik seizes.

“He’s my _friend_ , Altair. I _have_ to help him, he’d do the same for me.”

“You can’t go alone—”

“I’m not alone,” Malik cuts in, jerking his chained wrists for emphasis to add Altair to his equation.

The torrent of an odd syrupy warmth at being accepted as a companion, even at a moment like this, nearly coaxes Altair into unclasping the firm grip he’s established on Malik’s wrists. For an instance he’s lulled into contemplating risk at the cost of easing himself closer to Malik, but when he lifts his head off Malik’s imploring face he finds at least thirty weapon-laden men standing between his bare hands and Rauf and the risk retains its exclamation mark. The flogging is about to start; he wouldn’t even make it before the first lashes split the man’s skin.

“There’s too many. I lack a sword,” he utters and feels absurd between Malik practically bribing him with what he wants and his own helplessness in the face of opposition and spectators he doesn’t want as witnesses. There might be a chance to save Rauf. But this chance isn’t now.

Malik senses the hesitation in him before he voices it, uses the slackened grip to attempt escape. He’s quickly discarding him. He hasn’t even been given a proper chance.

A brief scuffle ensues between them again, much to the dismay of the people in their immediate vicinity, Altair persists where worry is wearing Malik out, and Malik remains locked in his grip, breathless. The crowd around them settles dense as before as soon as Malik yields and they come to a standstill.

He yields. And he’s silent. His head hung.

He’s nothing like his fiery self that Altair admires, he looks helpless and like something Altair doesn’t recognize. It’s as if he’s accepting the consequences of inaction, not because of Altair’s interference but because he’s quickly realizing that his rescue plan (if there ever existed one) has been flawed and bound for failure from the very start. It’s the face of a man accepting that there’s nothing he can do, and something else.

Up, on the temple podium, a voice announces that the flogging is about to begin.

This is not how Altair remembers the city he had protected. People have never been punished thus. Not without a trial. Not without an apparent victim.

Not on the order of one person.

As deep as his respect for Al Mualim runs, Altair can’t accept this act as part of their custom. He believes there’s many more among the crowd who see this in a like light. In his lifetime Altair had never seen a man gagged, stripped, and suspended for public flogging in front of the temple, never heard of anyone being left to die after torture, with the suffering broadcast to the city at large.

Malik’s shaking.

His hands, trapped below Altair’s chin, are fists, and Altair wouldn’t be able to recognize the reaction for what it is were it not for his own fingers constricted tight round Malik’s wrists and feeling the tremble that’s conquered Malik’s arms. His neck is bent and head tipped downward between them, his face hidden and unavailable for inspection.

It’s not a trick. He isn’t trying to ease Altair into letting go.

The whip-wielder swings at the blacksmith, the first crack of knout against skin splits the hush that had settled over the crowd. The next ones follow at unique intervals until the pace evens out and skin starts shedding from the man’s back, soon giving way to blood oozing in trickles, then streams. The blacksmith’s body shudders against the restraints.

They might flay the man to death.

He might die before they can do anything to save him.

There’s parents removing the children from the forum, there’s priests collecting the orphans into the orphanage. There’s guts being emptied, closer to the temple podium.

There’s a weakness in Malik’s knees and he buckles and doesn’t stumble into Altair’s chest, but Altair embraces him anyway.

With his head tucked under Altair’s chin he appears even smaller than their height difference suggests. He looks small and smells of memory. His breaths are heavy and emotion-infested, helpless and warm against Altair’s collarbone.

Altair has long wanted to hold him like this, yet never like this.

Never shrunk with futile attempt to conceal helplessness and struggling to listen to a bloodied knout splitting skin and pained groans of a friend.

Altair doesn’t know if Rauf will live to see the nightfall but he knows what helplessness feels like; he’s felt it at Malik’s feet. He doesn’t want to see Malik suffer the same ailment, his thirst for revenge isn’t as voracious as Malik’s.

He doesn’t know if the promise he’s about to make will hold, but promises accompany hope, so he seizes means available to him.

“Look at me,” he asks and when Malik doesn’t he draws his head back and pulls Malik’s up by the jaw, places his open hands on either side of Malik's face, like the sunshine, like the lashes of Hiba’s eye, “Tonight. Tonight I’ll come for him. He’ll be free,” he promises without theatrics, then allows Malik to flatten his front against him again after a whisper of a nod, vaguely surprised that Malik would choose to do so on his own.

“I’m sorry I can’t help him now… I’m sorry…” Altair trails off. In the crook of his arm he holds the back of Malik’s head, pressing a hiding face into his chest.

Up ahead, the knout is lashing relentlessly against Rauf until the flesh peels from his back.

Malik brings his hands up to his own ears and, pressing the small knobs of cartilage there, he stops listening.

It’s happening too fast.

Malik sees it already.

Al Mualim. The mass murderer of his people. Too powerful to be indicted, he will take the title without much noise, except from the handful eyes that can see through his facade. Running against his enemies, he will summon just enough panic for sufficient amounts of citizens to rally behind him, and be finally crowned the title of a god promised to someone else—perhaps to someone still unborn. Once in secure position, he will do his utmost to change the traditions in place, seeing as they don’t serve him so well. Utterly disillusioned, entire generations will lose all faith in justice, ensuring that the usurpers and murderers will reign for decades to come.

For the second time in his life, Malik feels abandoned by the gods.

And for the first time in his life, Malik feels not abandoned by his husband.

 

* * *

 

There’s three of them.

Altair and Desmond populating the low sofa and Malik treading a repetitive, monotonous path around the house.

The entire day has ceased to exist within the frame of its routine and boiled down to Altair abandoning plans he never made and Malik abandoning work that’s running desperately behind schedule to pace around the house in worry and anticipation of ‘the rescue’, as they’ve come to call it.

Altair and Desmond are in cahoots about the procedure. In a tacit, unspoken way they both know what’s to be done, which is wait for the night to set, go to the temple forum undetected, free Rauf, kill whoever stands in their path.

They’ve excluded Ezio. Altair hadn’t expected to include Desmond either, but Desmond included himself after consulting with them, since he appears to have had previous knowledge of his and Malik’s shared friendship with Rauf. Desmond had at the very least expected Malik to protest the cruel treatment and the subsequent public spectacle that was made of it, but finding out that they intend to rescue the blacksmith had hardly surprised him. The only natural outcome for Desmond had been to join in this secret (and illegal) effort.

So they’ve gathered in somber mood, in a room imbued by the orange glow of a sinking sun, as if waiting for a funeral.

They speak little of what had happened, if it all. Desmond is rolling soft pillow tussles into sausages between fingertips and Altair is watching Malik from the corner of his eye, and Malik, he realizes, recognizes nothing except his distress as he scrambles in reverse along the well-trodden circles, as if the thought of their ensuing intervention has impeded the memory of all that had happened (short-lived as it was) between them, as if he doesn’t recognize Altair as Altair but just another participant in this risky rescue mission of theirs. Having the image of himself erased in such a way doesn’t sit well with Altair, but he is learning to receive nothing for doing something.

He’s deep in thought when a hooded passer-by comes to a stand on the opposite side of the window shouldered by the side-wing of their low sofa—a dark figure sharply set off against the golden-red crepuscular stripe of sunset.

The figure isn’t passing on their way home.

It peers through the window catching a glimpse of them sitting inside, then slinks off. A heartbeat later the door cracks open, introducing the uninvited figure, now unhooded. The second uninvited Auditore pops in.

“Look at _this_ unfortunate collection...“ Claudia trails off with her eyes roving meaningfully over the three of them,“ And what are _you_ planning?“

After a prolonged moment of exchanged glances and abject silence, no one emerges self-possesed enough to speak up.

The hue of humor drops from her face and she immerses herself into the silence of their home wholly, putting the door in place with a push of her back.

“Rumors have it you’d liberate an innocent prisoner. I’ve come to join forces,“ she announces bluntly, still leaned against the door.

“By rumors you mean your own suspicions, I hope,“ Desmond says, already aware of her response and without addressing the issue of her participation—a mistake quickly remedied by Altair’s firm intervention.

“We don’t require more recruits,“ he announces, aware of the interest that has nestled on Malik’s face at the suggestion of more helpers.

“Well let me rephrase it then: you will join _my_ forces.“

“I don’t want you involved in this,” Altair tries on a different note, hoping to sound like someone who refuses not out of contempt but out of urge to protect the well-being of others, but his intention manages to miss its mark spectacularly.

“Really? How did you plan to get him anyway? Hide in plain sight and stroll over undetected?”

“Kill the guards.”

“You kill them. And _then_ what?” She asks, hands on hips, smugness dense in her tone.

Altair shrugs naively, complying with the confusion on Malik’s and Desmond’s faces, “And then we free the man?”

“That’s a barmy idea and you know it. Have you even given this a serious thought?” Her hands slip and are engulfed by long sleeves, her tone is now smoothed by camaraderie, “Everyone would know by sunrise that it was the work of someone from the city.”

“And so?” Malik this time.

“And so they’ll launch a search and hunt you down quicker than you can think,” she explains and predictably finds Altair most receptive to this reproach since it involves the possibility of inviting risk to Malik.

“Go on,” Altair says even after Malik and Desmond aren’t sufficiently convinced.

“They needn’t know that Rauf was freed by people, at least not at first.”

“So what do you propose then?”

“I propose we make it look as if he just disappeared. As if the gods themselves had a hand in it…”

 

* * *

 

 

By nightfall, it’s not four of them, but six.

Much to Altair’s growing discontent, their group of four has been joined by Mary and Leonardo. For a man used and comfortable with working by himself, this expanding company of liberators is fuel for concern.

“No offense to you, Leonardo, but was your participation a necessity?” Altair opens the dialogue after they’ve all gathered round the candlelight, with his home established as the meeting point. For his question he receives a significant glare from Malik, sitting conspicuously across him, a distance away (it stung more because of Malik’s continued lack of perception of him as his husband, since the decision to sit further away came unconsciously).

“The man’s back has been opened raw, surely you’ve thought about getting a doctor to look at him,” Mary quips, making him look irrational. He hasn’t thought beyond the next step. He hasn’t thought of what to do with an injured man after the rescue. The comfort of knowing that neither Desmond nor Malik had thought of this either is weak at best, knowing that Malik’s shortsightedness had been caused by distress and his own by nothing but his own faulty planning.

“So how’s Leonardo included in that equation?”

“He’s a doctor, unregistered,” Malik throws at him impatiently before Leonardo can speak for himself, as if it’s the most obvious information there is, as if he’s eager to shut down Altair’s protest against Leonardo’s presence.

“Is there anything you don’t do…” Altair mumbles privately, concedes, receives a benign smile from the blond fount of knowledge himself. Sagely, he retreats from the position of the leader, seeing how error-ridden his bony plan had been.

“You were going to kill the guards?” Mary coaxes him out of this self-initiated muteness right away.

“Yeah?”

“With what weapons? Far as I know all you ex-soldiers were left weaponless.”

The ensuing silence is unendurable and painful.

They were about to save the very man who was supposed to provide them with weapons. Getting a hold of weapons as a citizen is a though undertaking to begin with. Altair wishes he could say that he’d have borrowed Malik’s mighty sword. But the problem is twofold: taking Malik’s weapon would reveal his intention to exclude Malik from the rescue and, more importantly, Altair wouldn’t ask for Malik’s weapon, knowing how important it is to him.

Mary whistles out a demeaning tune, clearly enjoying their poor preparedness, “Good for you that you invited a city guard into your little group, as I’ve access to unlimited weapons supply. But wait, you _didn’t_ …”

“Alright, we get it,” Desmond butts in to put an end to the gloating. It does work wonders since the accusatory mood departs soon thereafter, replaced by an odd sense of connectedness, not entirely pristine but similar to what Altair had already felt in the company of warriors before.

“I’ll make sure we have weapons before we set off. I’ll make sure they’re returned unnoticed. Let’s pray, however, that those weapons remain unused tonight,” Mary appends meaningfully. She hasn’t told Anne. In this secretiveness she’s not alone, since Altair is keeping intentions from his own spouse as well.

“So if we’re not killing the guards, and if we’re not using weapons, what _are_ we doing?”

“Here’s the deal,” Claudia starts, leaning over the table conspiratorially, “You’ll get your weapons. We’ll leave here after midnight, we’ll approach the temple discreetly, by which time Mary will already be approaching the mercenaries with a city guard she trusts and she’ll take over the post—“

“By taking over the post she means cheating my way into the position,” Mary cuts in for clarification.

“Right. As soon as they’re gone, we release him, get him back here as quick as possible, and let Leonardo do his magic.”

“How do we get an injured man here that quick?”

“What do you mean by ‘ _here’_?” Altair demands suddenly, confoundedly enough to override Desmond’s logistical inquiry in both volume and urgency. Claudia takes pause, flapping her gaze between Malik and Altair to gauge the real head of the house.

“I thought he might stay with you.”

“This is _your_ plan, why wouldn’t he stay with _you_?”

“Rauf will stay with us,” Malik announces dogmatically before Claudia can muster a response.

Altair stares blankly, says nothing. Then utters a hollow sigh, lending further weight to Malik’s decision. This quick and painless (with the exception of Altair) settlement of Rauf’s sojourn allows them to return to Desmond’s question.

“My horse will do for the transportation,” Claudia explains.

“Right. So what exactly is our function?” Desmond asks wittily, referring to the rest of them.

“Moral support? Security in case of something going wrong? We’ll see.”

“So we wait for our weapons and we wait some more before we wait at the forum again?”

“Correct.”

“Our involvement in this is truly remarkable,” Desmond concludes, vaguely disappointed with the passive roles they’ve been assigned. They settle into a brief repose and Malik is the first one to stand up. Thinking nothing of it, Altair pays no attention to it, until Malik absentmindedly announces his intention:

“I’ll get my sword?”

“What purpose requires it?”

Malik fixes him with a decidedly puzzled face, “I’m going with you?”

A second silence settles over them like a blanket, and this time they’re all active participants in it. Malik recognizes protest when he’s at the receiving end of it. For a moment his face is imbued by nothing but confusion, then a passing annoyance—both equally fueled by insecurity—before the insecurity peels off and an anger that Altair has learned by heart by now ignites his face. An anger which Malik quickly and unjustly aims at Altair only.

“You’re not going _without me_ ,” he fumes, offended.

“Then I’m not going,” Altair responds evenly to Malik’s verbal belting, “And I promised that I would.”

Malik fidgets.

Rauf is nothing to Altair.

Keeping in mind the fact that all of them—all except for Altair—are connected by their friendship towards Rauf, Altair’s involvement in this whole risk-addled affair looks completely nonsensical. Were it not for the fact that Altair is willing to risk his life and reputation for the promise he’d given that morning. Malik can appreciate an honorable gesture, when he’s not forced to voice his appreciation. And presently, he isn’t particularly motivated to praise Altair’s honor, nor thankless enough to condemn him for his worry.

The drudgery of this gesture is having to be coddled by Altair’s protectiveness; the beauty of it is that Altair wants to do this for his sake.

And so he stands there and glares, and glares, and glares, and vows to glare until it’s enough for Altair to give in and secure him a place among their company.

Malik glares, in fact, until his disturbance threatens to engulf all of them and to torpedo the entire agreement.

“May I suggest we settle this as a group, by means of vote?” Claudia cuts through the silence tenderly and the suggestion agrees with all of them, even with Malik.

“Then, whoever is against Malik coming with us please raise their hand,” she says, lifting her hand immediately after. She’s quickly followed by the rest of her company, with the sole exception remaining Malik himself.

Jaw-slackened and open-mouthed, Malik is faced with five raised hands, five against his limp one.

He is struck by their concomitant vote; Altair is pleased. And inwardly thankful to Claudia for settling the vexed question of Malik’s participation.

 

* * *

 

 

The plot starts off as planned.

Tool-equipped Leonardo and fractious Malik remain at home, alert. The two ex-warriors find themselves equipped with two selfsame standard broadswords of city guards, provided by Mary’s endeavor. Claudia waits for them in the courtyard, on horseback. Mary awaits at the forum.

The first disturbance on their path happens already at the very outset, as they’re exiting the courtyard.

Just as they’re spat out by the tunnel they run into a boy, close to Malik’s age, and though they’re surprised to find anyone out at this hour their surprise morphs into dismay when the boy approaches Desmond specifically.

He won’t speak in the presence of Altair and Claudia, so Desmond flutters his hand to wave them off with the promise to follow after.

“I come on behalf of The Lady,” the boy informs as soon as the clap of Claudia’s horse rolls off downhill, “She sends for you. Tonight.”

The boy turns to depart without further ado but Desmond catches him by the forearm.

He realizes that this is Lucy’s messenger. There’s questions roiling in his head, most prominent of them the question of how this boy found him in the first place, and then the question of whether the way he refers to her is due to her newly-acquired title or a cryptogram—both of which he’ll keep unanswered tonight.

“Tonight’s not a good time. I’ve made plans. Tell her that.”

The boy looks visibly annoyed with his decision, he’s barely masking it. His face is young and pretty.

“There’s no need to. Your absence will serve equal purpose,” he retorts, upset, as if Desmond’s refusal has offended him by offending Lucy.

Desmond allows him to slip away this time. They part ways, he banishes thoughts of Lucy at present, then follows downhill, into the night.

 

* * *

 

 Their plans are going belly up.

The gradual awareness of their failure comes first as a dull numb feeling, then a sharp ache that hardens inside Altair’s chest when Claudia mutters the words he doesn’t want to hear at all:

“So far not so good,” she realizes with a dread, throwing Altair into a cold sweat.

Failing to free Rauf equals failing Malik. He can’t afford to fail Malik now. It’s _the_ solitary thought inhabiting his otherwise blank head as he watches their misbegotten plan unraveling up ahead, where Mary and her guard mate are _still_ engaged in a heated argument with the three mercenaries who’d been guarding Rauf.

The plan had been as clear as they get: wait for Mary to finish the coup of the post, release the prisoner, take him to safety.

They haven’t managed past the first step.

Despite the vigor with which Mary’d applied herself to persuading the mercenaries that they’ve been sent to take over the surveillance shift, the man who appears to be the head of the group views them as poaching on their turf.

His response to Mary’s alleged takeover hasn’t been abbreviated. It was supposed to be, according to their initial plans. He was supposed to wolf this information down in an instance and leave the post taking the remaining two mercenaries with him, but he tarries, suspicious. Moved to action at last by Mary’s insistence, he sends off one of the two mercenaries to verify the truth of their claims with the head of the city guard.

It wasn’t supposed to go this way.

Up, from the temple stairs, Mary is inconspicuously looking in their general direction before looking away.

Altair doesn’t need Claudia’s interpretation of a woman he doesn’t know as long in order to understand that Mary is at the utmost end of her wits and that they are, at the basics of things, deep in shit and unlikely to crawl out of it without much blood spilled to resolve the issue.

“It’s not working…” Claudia whispers the obvious, oddly calm as she utters this damning conclusion.

The pale-blue orphanage back-wall he is sidled up against is cool against his shoulder, Desmond’s breath is a warm breeze against his other, they’re sweating the same sweat, breathing the same anxiety. When his gaze plummets from Mary’s pasty and troubled face in the distance down to Claudia who is crouching below them, he finds her face a mask. She’s the type who keeps the calm at the worst of the worst. Fleetingly, Altair is glad to have her by their side, because his face is not a thoughtful kind of blank, but the kind that sees no other path but bloodshed.

“So far not so good…” she repeats to herself. She curls up tighter then, bends her neck to touch her forehead to her bent knees, becomes a tight, cloaked, immovable lump of black against blacker ground.

A moment passes by in utter silence.

Desmond stops breathing entirely; Altair stares at the cloaked figure curled at their feet and feels the weight of the borrowed sword cutting against his hip where the push of Desmond’s body lends it pressure, wonders if she’ll tell them to draw their swords after all, while the one mercenary is away. Altair is, after all, best at receiving orders.

The black stallion puffing heavily behind their backs—Claudia’s pride and joy—suddenly heaves a rumbling breath that shudders off into a nicker—a sound that suddenly lifts her from the ground like a springboard. She swirls around, fetching Altair by the front of his tunic.

“Find me a lantern—“

“ _What_ —?”

“Find me a lantern,” she barks, all throat and husk, shaking him for emphasis, “Find it, make it, give birth to it, pray to gods for it, I don’t care. Find me a lantern, _now_.”

Released from the grip, Altair scrambles off to where his wits lead him first, which happens to be the very opposite side of the spot that is currently their hideout, which also happens to be the front porch of [Hiba](http://the-king-of-novices.tumblr.com/post/105028879746/live-forever-or-die-trying-the-pantheon-310)’s orphanage—always unguarded and always teeming with hanging lanterns. This way or the other he’ll get one down.

His departure leaves Claudia and Desmond alone and staring upwards at the darkened window they were hiding below—Claudia of her own volition and Desmond just as to mimic her actions for the lack of a better occupation.

“That’s where they keep food, isn’t it?” she asks out of the blue.

Judging by the pungent smell of garlic and sun-dried peppers wafting down at them through the crack, as well as by Desmond’s foggy memory of the orphanage’s food storage, this happens to be one.

“I think so.”

“Find me some flour. Refined.”

“ _What_?”

“Stop asking questions and get inside,“ she orders, bending to lock her hands for a boost.

“Why don’t _you_ go?”

“Because I suggested it,” she hisses up at him, wagging the awaiting boost in anticipation.

“That doesn’t even make sense,” Desmond mutters, producing a coin from a side-pouch, “Head or tails?”

“And this _makes_ sense? Heads,” she adds quickly nonetheless, though not without exasperation.

The winner is determined by a coin toss.

She wins.

Desmond’s never learned not to bet against her. A repeated victim to the same unfortunate mistake. There’s some muttering as he eyeballs the small size of the window frame. The window is high and tiny by his standards.

“You’re smaller anyway.”

“You’re the orphan, you know where they keep the flour? I don’t need much.“

“How am I supposed to know, we weren’t allowed in here?!“

“Just find it,“ she rants right back, already bent and taut and ready for his foot.

With a second bout of muttering he tests the rigidness of her locked hands, finds her ready for a boost, and counts while measuring the distance up to the window. A grunt, a lift, a grapple, a breathless lung, a knock against yielding glass, and Desmond finds himself hauled belly-over the window pane. It’s a tight squeeze through the frame.

“Why do you even need fucking flour?“ is the last she hears of him before he vanishes from sight.

Altair seems to be having less luck with his ordeal since Desmond emerges with his find first, hanging off the ledge with a sack dangling off his grip.

“Catch,” he drops the find, following soon thereafter.

She welcomes the powdery sack, doesn’t bother to dust herself off before setting to work. Much to Desmond’s dismay and subsequent realization, she starts slapping handfuls of flour along her black stallion’s lower body, progressing from his rump towards his mighty legs. Altair is soon back with a lantern. Desmond begins to glimpse the fringes of her intention.

“Do as I say now: their backs are turned to you, climb up to him undetected, unbind the ropes, don’t release him. Tell him to stay put.”

They run off and seem, as they run, to be immersed into the web of the plot she’s knitted around a failed stratagem.

Except for the torches simmering at the entrance to the quiet temple, a misty gauze of moonlight provides the only source of light. Veiled by the shroud of darkness they climb the side of the temple podium undetected, taking cover behind the trunks of marble columns as soon as they conquer the height. There, they’re spotted by Mary. Further down the stairs, a negligible distance from where Rauf has been suspended on ropes, the pair of mercenaries stand with backs turned to the captive and to them. Mary and her guard mate, though, have stood face-up towards the temple ever since they’d walked up the cascade of temple stairs to trick the men into leaving.

They’re spotted by her, then neglected. She wears her mask as well as Claudia.

Though not privy to this sudden change of plans and completely removed from fresh information, Mary infers that distracting the mercenaries further to give Altair and Desmond leeway is beneficial to whatever plot they’ve concocted during her absence. If anything, she looks more relieved than her guard mate who’d failed to spot them up there where they’re hopping from column to column.

The sight that greets Altair as soon as they reach the first ring of ropes is ghastly, infuses little hope.

Along the expanse of the blacksmith’s back, the flesh is a hemorrhaging mesh of clot and red-washed shreds of skin; burrows running and intersecting and bleeding along what used to be his back where skin and flesh have been shredded by the knout. The sight of it turns Altair’s stomach and curdles his spit in a way not unfamiliar to him.

The man’s lost blood. Altair won’t put it past him to remain unresponsive despite their poke. Claudia’s done right, in more than one way, for bringing her horse along.

“Rauf?” Desmond rasps in the softest of whispers, from the shelter of the other, right column. Altair turns to loosening the knot roped together by the winding cord and finds it stubborn and justifying a blade’s use. The talking he leaves to Desmond, seeing how the man has actually responded to him by somewhat lifting his head to imply consciousness.

“Mercenaries...” Rauf warns through a parched throat. There’s still fight left in him.

“No fight. We’ll cut these, but stay put. Claudia will come for you,” Desmond rushes through these frugal instructions, hoping he’s relayed the gist of the message, and finds Rauf drooping his head as before, silent.

Desmond is a while behind Altair in knotting the severed rope back, loosely, after cutting through the original knot with the blade in Altair’s fashion. Their retreat is swifter than their approach, fueled by the gruesome state of Rauf’s injuries and the immediate attention they require.

They never manage to regroup at the hideout; before they’ve found shelter behind the orphanage, the stallion rushes past carrying a goddess.

That’s what she looks like.

That’s what she fools like.

The story goes that [Masekha](http://the-king-of-novices.tumblr.com/post/106253964456/live-forever-or-die-trying-the-pantheon-510)’s sacred horse is black; and white.

White at the onset of night and turning black from head-down as they gallop through the city, absorbing the night. Black by the sunrise, and turning white as they sleep by day, absorbing the light.

Claudia has utilized their finds shrewdly. Desmond’s flour for the trick of turning her horse into a vision of the sacred black-white stallion. Altair’s lantern for the moonshine in [Masekha](http://the-king-of-novices.tumblr.com/post/106253964456/live-forever-or-die-trying-the-pantheon-510)’s hand. Claudia’s cloak for the costume of a goddess of disguises. Together, they’ve crafted the likeness of Masekha galloping through the city, disguised by hood, with moonshine in hand, mounted on a stallion that has almost absorbed the night.

She rushes past the stony bulk of the temple podium, swerves left through the gargantuan forum columns, emerges as an apparition before she galloping up the cascade of temple-stairs in the image of a goddess.

The horse’s hooves sound like metal on stone, like an empty galvanized pail tossed down a staircase, a full, complete sound.

Mary needs but a moment to play along.

With awe-ridden face, she drops to her knees in faked trepidation and is followed immediately by a similar gesture of veneration, though a genuine one, as her guard mate and a mercenary more familiar with their folklore both fall to their knees before the apparition of [Masekha](http://the-king-of-novices.tumblr.com/post/106253964456/live-forever-or-die-trying-the-pantheon-510) ascending the temple on her sacred horse.

The head of the mercenaries, their main obstacle, is smoothed into submission at the sight of three people prostrating themselves exultingly. The billowing epidemic of their veneration towards the mounted figure overtakes him, and he falls, too.

It takes Claudia so very little to close the distance. Rauf already expects her, and when she wordlessly extends her free hand towards him, he pulls on the loosened ropes, sets himself free in the eyes of the astounded onlookers, as if his ropes have been cut by divine intervention.

There’s hardly a breath released as the blacksmith staggers towards the animal; not a whisper of protest as he’s hauled up by a goddess’ hand and drawn onto the horse.

Nothing but awe as the man is whisked off by a mortal woman, into the home of a mortal couple.

 

* * *

 

Malik takes the injuries with remarkable poise.

For a boy at the cusp of adolescence and a citizen far-removed from the putrid foulness of open war wounds, he works in tandem with Leonardo with moderately-skilled hands and absence of disgust. Leonardo had taught him more than Altair had previously considered.

He cleans injuries with soap and water; knows which ointments to apply; excels at dressing the wounds. He dabbles in suturing some of the shallower lacerations, to aid Leonardo in the race against time, and Leonardo sutures the cuts that go through the full thickness of skin and are standing open. He doesn’t meddle in the cutting off of dead tissue, leaving this to Leonardo’s seasoned hands. He doesn’t shy away from blood.

Malik compensates.

Whatever opportunity has been denied to him by exile from the rescue itself, he seeks to balance by other means available to him. That’s what it looks like to Altair. It’s what he tells himself as he watches Rauf’s head cradled by his husband’s lap. It’s what he reasons to his gut when Malik’s hand lingers on Rauf’s cheek and his voice drops to a soothing whisper.

It’s to keep the man conscious.

He’s lost enough blood to turn him weak, faint, disoriented. He looks a pale version of the strong man Altair had seen and punched the other day. Sapped of all strength and bleeding. Flogging and dehydration will do that to the mightiest of warriors.

“He’ll need sterile dressings. Daily. I’ll provide,” Leonardo explains, allowing himself a sigh after finalizing what he could do for a back this injured, “The scarring may prevent him regaining full movement of his arms. Moving will be uncomfortable, at least in the first few weeks, possibly months, depending on infection.”

Rauf has left them. Fatigued by the ordeal but pacified by a sanctuary, he’s drifted off leaving a group of six scattered across the room with varying degrees of satisfaction.

Altair isn’t best pleased by the fact that they’re hiding a fugitive in their home. He’s downright displeased that Malik seems to be rather close to the man. He prompts himself to correct this nugget of jealousy, periodically. The sight of his own domestic gaffe from two days ago keeps him in check and reminds him of how idiotic his costly outburst had been now that Malik’s ruined carpet has left the room looking emptier. At least the wooden flooring is polished and pretty.

“Well, we’ve made it this far,“ Mary breaks the silence, weary, but still able to instill some cheer into her worn-out voice.

“You’re laying claim on my laurels,” Claudia jibes back at her good-naturedly.

“Some stunt you pulled there. Gods know why I went along with it.”

“Agreed,” Desmond butts in, clearly not over the flour affair.

Malik wants to know everything.

It takes a while to recount the tale. A couple hours time disappear without notice, slip away for the rest of them, but can’t pass fast enough for Altair. Mary’s the one to leave first, having to cover up for a lie to Anne by pretending to return from her night-shift. Claudia and Desmond leave together. Leonardo is the last to leave, and not by his own will. He’s pried away from checking Rauf’s wounds by Salai.

Altair’s sour mood sours further after realizing that Leonardo’s apprentice is also privy to what had occurred that night. A growing number of witnesses is bad business. Malik allays his fear and distrust in Salai, however, and Altair leaves off, largely because Malik is talking to him completely unbridled from aloofness for a change.

The hour is nearing dawn by the time their home has shaken off all its visitors, save for Rauf who’s had the low sofa in the first room accommodated for his stay.

The matter of hiding a fugitive is a pressing one, but addressing it now won’t earn him Malik’s good graces. And it feels good to be talked to, like Malik is doing while he works on preparing the bed for them both. Now that he’s not quite drugged by a sense of urgency and worry, as well as mellowed out by fatigue, Malik is starting to address Altair directly, for the first time since the public flogging—not through the lens of some rescue, not by association to some gathering, but him personally, _him_.

”Does this mean we’re talking again?“ Altair asks with a hint of tease, naively and unwisely, having yesterday night in mind.

There’s a distance to travel from his mouth to Malik’s ears.

It takes Malik a moment to realize that he has, indeed, spoken to Altair as if nothing had happened yesterday, as if no rejection of him as a husband ever took place. It’s easy for Altair to spot the sudden shift in Malik’s language—body and spoken, or the lack thereof. Malik is slipping through his fingers again.

“So no, I see…” he answers in Malik’s stead, pushing him only deeper into new-found old reclusiveness.

Far from the first time, Altair realizes that he’s not only alone in this marriage—he’s lonely. But for the first time he realizes that he shouldn’t be putting his efforts into good humor, since it seems to serve only to prick at Malik’s pride, he should be working himself beside Malik’s side in a just and honest way instead of cheating his way in.

“So when can we speak normally again?”

“Never?”

“Why?”

Malik is finished with setting the bed for the night and has no excuses to remain standing. But he does, with gaze lowered at the tousled sheets, at nothing, and clings to silence.

“Why, Malik?”

Altair doesn’t want to corner him, though he does. He knows the perils of forcing Malik into a position where escape requires attack, but he limits himself to merely circling the bed halfway around, to innocently emphasize his pressing curiosity, and he limits his persistence to questions only.

“Why? Haven’t I proven myself enough for words at least? Can’t we be honest for once? Can’t you tell me reasons, like a man, eye to eye?”

Malik keeps his stubborn stare on the sheets, but much has changed: his face is choking with budding anger and body tightening hostilely, the anger sitting on his brows is black and dreadful. He’ll burst.

Altair has broken the dam already and, cursing himself for this utter lack of discipline, he cuts the remaining distance, tactlessly.

“ _Why_ , Malik—?”

“Because I hate you!” Malik barks suddenly, staring up at him, all ablaze.

It sounds childish to Altair; Malik wants a fight and Altair doesn’t have it in him to put up a fight.

“Because I _hate_ you,” he barks out again, and this time he’s moving.

It all happens in a flash and for Altair there’s no way of rendering it in less than so many consecutive thoughts. Malik’s fist hammers suddenly into his chest, just above his heart—a mighty hit.

“I hate _everything_ about you,” he roars—no guest, no hour can censor his volume—and pounds fiercely against the spot his fist has chosen until the force of it starts pushing Altair backwards one step at a time.

“I _hate_ the way you look, I hate that I find you attractive, I _hate_ that I want to be touched by you, I hate _myself_ for it—“ he’s choking with a sob that wants out, can barely flex his throat enough to let words past, he’s forgetting himself. It’s a frequent flaw.

Through the frenzy of the fugue Malik keeps pounding at Altair’s chest, inching him into retreat ever so slightly—he can’t do much damage except for leaving Altair bewildered, disembodied, dizzy from the chase after the fount of Malik’s sudden rage.

“I hate that you’re my husband, I _hate_ you, but above _all_ I hate that you _left_ me—“

Altair freezes.

The branching chill oozing down his frozen spine hurts more than the spasms of Malik’s fist thundering against his chest.

“—I _hate_ that you left me alone, I was a _child_ , Altair. I had no one and nothing, I was helpless, and you _left_ me, and I _hate_ you for it—“ he severs his speech there abruptly, puts a stop to his convoluted sentences, and, soldering his rigid and pulsing fist against the spot he has abused, he breaks into his first sob.

Altair has heard that sob before. Once. When he held a child’s hand in his own.

If Rauf has heard anything, he is quiet.

Malik is crying by now, and Altair is too. But they’re crying different tears. Altair the ones that blurry one’s vision with the helplessness of a past folly; Malik cries freely, with the absence of shame like those people whose tears are long overdue, who are well past their limits. _These_ sobs have been trapped inside a child Altair never knew, they’re years old.

“There were days when I didn’t have bread to eat and soap to wash myself. I left school when no one else had to, for work, to feed myself... I was a child and I had no one and I was lonely, and you _left_ me, Altair—“ he stops for shortage of breath, sniffs stiffly through a phlegm-constricted nose.

The beam of a candle touches his clammy cheek; a bright drop quivers under his nostril. Altair sees the wide eyes and small face of a child and his body unwinds itself from the freeze, and envelops him into a full-bodied hug.

He doesn’t know if it’s welcome, but it’s not denied. He holds him because _he_ needs it. Because there’s no way he can make up for it and nothing he can offer but this embrace.

“I’m sorry,” he wants it to sound its best but it’s little more than a faint croak, “I’m so sorry… I wish I hadn’t left. If I could choose again, I’d never go to war…”

Malik is crying, like he’s never cried since the Massacre, like Altair’s chest is there to soak up all the tears that he had collected over the years of his sad childhood, and Altair feels he’s never held Malik tighter and felt more of a shit while doing so.

Altair puts himself in a child’s shoes.

He imagines that Malik had really felt like something is always missing.

In fact his entire life has been made of _missing_ something.

First his family and home, then his safety, then someone to help him along through the transition from thirst for revenge to blending with a community and becoming part of them, and then, after receiving false news of his husband’s death upon the battlefield, someone he had given his loyalty to in exchange for safety, and, then, after said husband’s return—his peace. And now he’s missing sexual gratification too, an appetite for which Altair himself had initiated, an appetite Malik doesn’t want to quench with his husband. Just another fresh addition on top of all the missings that Malik’s life has been riddled with.

The passage from tears to stillness takes a while.

Rauf’s breathing is humble behind him, back in the first room; he’s unsure if the man’s sleeping at all. The sun might be clambering over the horizon’s precipice; he’s unsure with the draped windows. He’s unsure of what Malik thinks, if at all, while he breathes himself full of Altair’s chest, keeping his chin low. It’s not the first time today that they’re caught in this lock.

When he looks up at last, his face looks utterly ravished by the liberal shedding of tears, and his voice is predictably hoarse and oddly remorseful, as if he’s just been poked from an exceptionally bad dream.

“Apologies... I don’t know what came over me.”

“It’s alright,” Altair utters and feels empty.

When the push against his chest reveals to him that Malik is about to disengage from the hold, Altair catches him by the wrist before he can slip away, then shepherds Malik’s hand into his own.

Malik breathes and watches this hold of hands that is his passivity and Altair’s convulsive clench of his limp fingers; he inspects it as if it’s something offensive.

“So… you hate me,” Altair hears himself utter and feels the chasm in his gut deepen.

“Yes,” Malik says and feels bad saying it.

”Do you—...” Altair stops after a false start, feels like he’s swallowing dust and breathing damnation, “Can you… find it in yourself to forgive me, in future?“

Malik admits to himself that he had lied to Altair before, that he’d been willing to bend the truth to fit his needs. He could tell him a myriad things; a thousand false or genuine thoughts; but he waits until he hears a response from the far side of his brain, from his conscience, and settles for:

“I think so. But not yet.“

“I understand,” Altair says, and he doesn’t.

He doesn’t understand why the thought of abandoning a child hadn’t struck him before as it does now. Nor why the promise of Malik’s forgiveness gives him hope which he needs to go on with his life in a meaningful way.

“But I need to confess that I’ve been—I have… fallen for you. I love you despite your shortcomings,“ Altair stammers through, hoping for nothing. 

Malik looks down, then away.

“You love me? That’s your loss.”

Malik doesn’t see it coming, but Altair folds in on himself to fall to his knees (and he will fall to his knees for him only three times in his life).

His clothes utter a faint swish as he sinks to floor and creeps up to Malik on his knees to fasten his hand around his ankle and hold his other one out, upwards, in supplication, akin to what he’d done yesterday. His neck bent and head touching Malik’s knees humbly.

“Don’t leave me. I can’t leave you. Please tell me you can find it in yourself to forgive and love me. Say it even if it’s a lie,” he begs, his voice that of a man drowning on dry land.

Malik would like to tell himself that he’s deliberating as he watches Altair’s suppliant hand awaiting his touch, but he’s tired beyond thinking and only wastes time by delaying the touch of mercy asked of him. The outcome of this had been settled in his head long before he responds, and nothing would alter it this time, and his response is brushing the tips of his fingers against Altair’s splayed palm to acknowledge his supplication, then wrapping his fingers round Altair’s in a loose hold.

“I don’t love you. But—“ he falters and it takes courage to voice sincerity for once, “But I think I could.”

Something’s smooth and thick inside Altair’s chest as he straightens his back to press a cheek against Malik’s hip like a worshiper and wind his free arm around his waist to cling to his back. The words have cauterized his wound but not eliminated it. But it works to clear the path for his intention. When a man sets his intention, it sets the compass of his heart in that direction and the obstacles that appeared unconquerable before become workable because he knows where he’s going. He has a path now, thorny as it is.

Malik allows him to cleave to the hand that has initiated the touch; allows him to flatten his lips to its skin and hold it as if it’s something delicate and precious.

“Your touch has been missed,” Altair whispers and the heat of his cheek seeps through Malik’s nightclothes, warming his hip.

Malik knows he means the touch of his hand. What he doesn’t is that more than once Altair had resisted the urge to seize the hand that had poked out from the sheets and take it into his own. What he doesn’t is what joy a touch of hands can bring to a man. 

He runs his freed thumb over scuffed, dry knuckles, as if to translate some sense of comfort or reassurance.

With his other hand, he strokes Altair’s scalp.

An absentminded graze of blunt nails across the crown of his head down to the soft, velutinous hairs around his nape. A caress of short, growing hair before he settles on a discovered imperfection and the pad of his thumb strokes the faded line of a past scar while he wonders how Altair’s helmet had allowed itself to be penetrated enough to allow such scarring.

Learning to love him would be easy.

Malik has often kept blinders tight around himself. He feels like a self-imposed blinder has been taken off as he allows himself to realize that the reason he is repulsed by loving Altair is because he doesn’t want to have something else that can be lost.

That this skin he pets is penetrable.

That this heart will stop beating.

That he can’t protect those he loves.

That there’s no armor that can protect them.

That he can do _nothing_ to stop that.

The blinder is irreparably off, and he knows that this is why he’s resisting at all cost, why he’s repulsed so much by something that reminds him of his helplessness. That’s why he’s resisting forgiveness, too, because he’s scared to death of how vulnerable he is in the moments when he feels he can’t protect what he loves.

Malik’s mind is reeling; his face feels raw and his throat parched, his insides muddled with confusion.

His head refuses to think and he’s reduced to nothing but the warmth of Altair’s cheek against his hip and the soft tickle of hair gliding along his petting palm.

And in this absence of thought, he opens his eyes and looks past the doorway splitting their bedroom from the first room, and finds Rauf peering at them quietly from the low sofa.

“It’s nice to hear you’re resolving your issues,” Rauf tells him, some mischief traceable in his voice.

“Good night, Rauf,” Malik mutters, flustered.

Beyond the concealed window to their left, the sun is stealing over mountaintops.

 

 

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Friendly reminder that people are more honest than usual and/or duking it out in front of Rauf, because Rauf = god(ess) of war.
> 
> Always happy to hear thoughts and predictions <3<3


	14. Chapter 12

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> This comes later than expected but, hey, at least I finished the chapter before my birthday...
> 
> I wanted to take this opportunity to share a _gorgeous_ art piece that a lovely person created for this story, and I'm always awed when people get inspired and draw the most beautiful art or sketches because of it. I hope you can take a moment to look at her artistic interpretation of [Altair's jealousy](http://veriathen.deviantart.com/art/Altairs-Jealousy-Malik-Al-Sayf-612975641), which I adore.

 

 

 

* * *

 

 

“I don’t know if I… _should_ love him.”

Dawn had arrived with rosy fingers, spilling orange light onto the island.

Leonardo’s roguish home, however, remains obscured. Its position never invites dawn inside. So they sit under the watch of a runny candle, a solitary fruit bowl between them—an exception in his otherwise eternally messy studio. Some of the grapes glow purple and gold under the light; Malik eyes them and considers what to throw together for breakfast before Altair or Rauf rouse from sleep.

“Love and forgiveness aren’t for the faint-hearted,” Leonardo tells him in soft sigh and solid conviction, “Passing around hatred is the easiest thing there is. Deciding to not bequeath this legacy of hate on others is harder.”

“So I should just forget about all that happened?”

“No. Nor should you ever forget. You can accept the betrayal and the suffering, you can bear it. But you shouldn’t retaliate by passing it on to those who want to be close to you.“ 

“He left me.”

“And so? Maybe he thought that was the wisest choice to make? Maybe he thought that’s the best work that he could do to support and protect you?”

“He _left_ me… Without protection…” Malik insists with the tone of a person who is running out of better arguments, his face sour.

“I was there to protect you, you were not alone—“

“But I wanted _his_ protection. _His_. _He_ was my husband, not you,” Malik fumes in a sudden fit and Leonardo can sense that he isn’t in full command of his faculties, his face is sober but his emotions far from it. Knowing how bereft of insult to him personally and full of self-denial this confession is, Leonardo finds himself oddly amused and partly saddened.   

“I see…” he drawls, just to fill in the gap in conversation during a quest for the least painful way to put his point across, “Malik, could it be that, possibly, just in theory… you are falling in love with your husband? That this feeling of betrayal on his part is harder to forgive because of this new attachment?”

Malik doesn’t respond at first and the silence swells tensely.

Leonardo watches him and Malik watches the runny candle sputter in agitated jolts. His tongue bathes in silence, his eyes in dark circles. He hasn’t slept. He’s faked sleep long enough to send Altair off to slumber. Somewhat remorsefully, he has nudged Leonardo from rest, thirsty for a talk. A vessel to empty his thoughts into and receive a cold splash of awakening in return. It seems to work that way with him and Leonardo.

“Malik… you make a normal human thing feel so… _convoluted_ with all the drama you lay over it,” Leonardo cracks the silence and his voice is decently dressed in gentleness, to counter the harshness of the words he’d always wanted to tell Malik but never had, “If you looked just for a moment even mildly objectively at life, you’d see that you hurt other people as much as _you_ hurt. You’d see that you’re so unimaginably selfishly absorbed, and because of this you magnify everything out of proportion.”

Malik freezes motionless.

Another instant and a sullen grimace obliquely bursts in and unfolds across his face.

He is offended, but passingly. Anger and offense are a floating population in Leonardo’s presence. They’ll visit Malik in a moment of thoughtlessness and disappear as soon as he sifts Leonardo’s words through his mind a second time.

“That’s it, isn’t it? You are so self-absorbed that you think the world begins and ends with you. So you convince yourself that you’re nobler than you are. And with all the walls you put around yourself, you’ve come here expecting sympathy. Don’t expect people to feel sympathy for injuries when you inflict them yourself—it doesn’t make sense to feel sympathy for someone who commits the crime that they suffer.”

The words fill Malik up and come aboil with a solid, boisterous sting in the center of his chest. His throat and eyes. And it hurts. But Leonardo has spoken these words with no trace of contempt or overbearing and with all the gentleness of a doting parent who is steering the child in the right direction. Knowing this, Malik’s anger defies directing itself towards Leonardo and, with nowhere else to turn to, it collides backwards directly against its creator, against him, and hurts all the more.  

“How do you expect someone like me to start being happy all of a sudden?” he mumbles out and the volume of his voice isn’t enough to even nudge the candle flame into a quiver, as it had before. 

 He struggles.

There’s still capacity for love in him, something that wants to know what it means to feel alive. And he _must_ learn to love before his heart turns into a walnut.

He struggles, and Leonardo knows why he clings to his hatred so stubbornly.

He hasn’t lost his senses yet. He senses that once the hate is gone, he will be forced to deal with his own pain. With no hatred to mask it. And when he can’t bear his pain he projects it onto everyone else to perpetuate this endless hatred because he’s unable to bear the measure of suffering given to him. He doesn’t know how.

“Malik, they’ve taken so much. They’ve destroyed the nobles, they’ve oppressed you, killed your family, burned your home to ground, forced you into child marriage. Why should you also let them take your joy and peace of mind?”

Leonardo stops there, expecting a reply, but finds Malik still processing his words and, recognizing some degree of interest lurking in his face, he decides to wrap his argument into language that Malik will understand and appreciate best:

“Joy is your moral obligation. If you don’t allow yourself joy, then you collaborate with those who’ve done you injustice. Allowing happiness is another way of revenge, isn’t it?”

If Malik’s thoughts even marginally reflect the state of his face expression, he is seriously considering this proposition.

“I think so…” he admits at last.

“So go on and do what pleases you. You said your husband’s body pleases you, didn’t you?” Leonardo throws the suggestion in as it seems the easiest one to appreciate in the short run.

“Yes, but… I can’t while Rauf is there,” Malik mutters—not without some luggage of shyness attached to his tone—and wrings his hands to have something to look at while avoiding Leonardo’s amused gaze. 

“You can send Rauf to me at nightfall.”

 

* * *

 

When Altair wakes, he’s not the only one.

Malik is cooking and the heat is waking the spices.

By the time he hauls himself from the bed Malik is trying to feed Rauf porridge and failing miserably. Rauf has arrested the bowl from Malik’s hold after laboriously shifting his shoulders to prop himself up on the sofa. Altair’s reaction to this is twofold, and both involve incongruous dislikes: he dislikes the idea of Malik feeding another man, yet he dislikes that Rauf is rejecting Malik’s kindness. An odd concoction of emotions, dispelled as soon as Malik turns around and, finding him there awake, greets him with surprising cordiality.

“Good morning. Sit. I’ll bring your meal,” he instructs, brushing past him and leaving Altair swept over by this utter lack of hostility towards him.

It’s not because of Rauf’s presence. He hopes it’s not.

Overwhelmed by the lip-smacking smells wafting from the kitchen, Altair casts a scrutinizing look at the contents of Rauf’s bowl after taking a seat at the table and finds his inspection immediately misinterpreted.

“I’m feeling better than I look,” Rauf informs him between spoonfuls and though Altair has some doubts about that, he refrains from mentioning the actual target of his scrutiny.

Altair wouldn’t admit it aloud, but he can’t nudge himself into caring enough for this man’s well-being, unless it’s inextricably tethered to Malik’s own, and he doesn’t feel any less compassionate for feeling so. There’s still some jealousy-inspired animosity towards the blacksmith alive within him that keeps him from embracing the man into a friendly hold.

“We’ve yet to determine that. Leonardo’s coming after breakfast to help me re-dress your wounds,” Malik insists while putting the meal before Altair.

Then he lingers there for a moment.

This momentary pause doesn’t stretch the limits of Altair’s surprise too much at first, it seems to him as if it’s the result of Malik angling the bowl to look its prettiest, but then the outline of Malik’s cold palm imprints itself below his nape noiselessly, feathery like a butterfly moored on a flower. Altair hasn’t felt a lighter touch laden with a heavier impact.

“Enjoy your meal,” Malik utters under his breath, sounds almost self-conscious because he _means_ it.

The meal is a spectacle for the eye, but lacking one crucial ingredient that Rauf’s meal is not. 

“No seasoning for a seasoned warrior?” he notices, jestingly, hopeful that Malik won’t respond to the wit as unfavorably as he tends to.

“You told me you wanted less spice,” Malik responds, somewhat puzzled.

“It might be best to get used to it again. But I owe gratitude. It’s kind of you to think of that,” Altair quickly adds and can’t remember the last time he’d been actually aware of someone considering his needs. And he would have prolonged the chat, had Malik not responded to his appreciation with noticeable bashfulness flourishing in the very posture of his body and the shift in his expression. Malik retreats when he feels himself too unskillful to respond to acknowledgement, but not without a deliberate brush of fingertips as he allows his fingers to drag across warm skin while pulling the hand off Altair’s nape.

Altair feels its imprint on his skin long after Malik’s returned to the kitchen, and stares at his breakfast.

An oatmeal porridge. Steaming and incredibly creamy, crowned with chunks and slices of fruit in all their gaudy glory of colors, dried and fresh.  A heaping handful of berries, spilling over, and crushed nuts sprinkled on top generously, along with a dusting of poppy seeds. Though robbed of spices, of cinnamon, nutmeg, and ground ginger whose scents waft from Rauf’s bowl, Altair’s is compensated for this loss with a spoonful of his favorite jam warmed into an impromptu sauce and drizzled on top. He almost feels remorseful for upsetting something simple Malik had put a lot of thought into with something as trivial as a meal. Yet he wolfs the bowl down in a flash with the deepest appreciation before Rauf can even empty half of his own.

Malik is scrubbing a few dishes in the lavabo when Altair returns the bowl to the kitchen.

He thinks of nothing when he sets the dish down for Malik’s taking, but he’s hit by sudden inspiration to do the similar as on the forum yesterday and put his hand passingly on the small of his back, as a reference or acknowledgement of Malik’s earlier touch on his nape.

He doesn’t think much of it.

He doesn’t think it significant enough to make a substantial difference.

It’s already at the limits of what he dares initiate after their last conversation and it’s nothing but a personal desire disguised in the garbs of a mutual gesture.

Malik’s response is wordless but beyond what Altair’s passing, cautious touch has warranted.

Altair isn’t well-versed with words, but saying that Malik has proceeded to _insert_ himself against his chest in response to his puny touch would do the description some justice. Before Altair knows it, he’s no longer passingly taking a position behind Malik to put a damn bowl on a counter, but having handfuls of Malik attached to his front. Before Altair can even process any of it, his pelvis is pressed firmly against Malik’s ass, and his arms are comically frozen while Malik continues pretending to wash some utensils.

He stares at the crown of Malik’s unruly hair without blinking from beneath joined eyebrows, motionless in the apathy of absolute fear.

Now, let it be said that Altair is no longer fond of overstepping boundaries and initiating anything while he’s on probation. However, as Malik starts pushing himself further back and slotting the length of his back to Altair’s torso, Altair finds himself willing to be persuaded otherwise.

He sets his hands on Malik’s waist and holds there.

Something, someone, must have poked Malik into assuming the role of the initiator. It’s the only thought fathered by Altair’s confusion. Malik’s behavior is a plot that has so many convolutions that it’s difficult to follow. The caveat of giving in to Malik’s current whim is possibly (probably) being rejected later on after Malik comes to regret this bout of spousal fondling.

But feeling that Malik is shrugging himself into his hold and shifting against him to press his ass more firmly into his crotch is starting to weather his resistance thin. Before he can suffocate in his own pungent odor of insecurity, the outline of Malik’s half-lidded wanton face flashes into his view and from here it takes so very little encouragement, since he naturally craves it. So he names himself weak and goes in for a touch.

From the hold on Malik’s sides it’s effortless to shift and wind arms round his middle and tug him closer. To this pull Malik responds by straightening up, rolling his shoulders back as if eager to seek out Altair’s pecs with his shoulder blades alone. It works only to glue them tighter together and unhamper Altair’s arms for more touching—a task entrusted solely to Altair’s hands since Malik insists on washing dishes and pretending he hasn’t just tacitly requested to be fondled.

Altair tolerates pretense for one reason only.

Malik looks tender for body contact but also afraid of love he is asking for.

His passions are fleshy but boneless and unable to stand on their own. What Altair is about to give is what is asked of him; a verdict he bases on the evidence that Malik has initiated it. After all, the reason he has ‘bumped’ into Altair isn’t because the kitchen isn’t spacious enough for two. With one hand he glides up the front of Malik’s tunic, paving the path for his entire arm to follow, and Malik welcomes this touch by pushing into it, hunting for friction, laying traps for Altair’s courage.

Altair is dizzy with everything he wants to do.

As though his time is severely limited, he attempts too much at once; being gentle and tightening his grip to paw at Malik’s chest until he’s burning up and can’t stop touching him.

Malik’s nipples are hard and perked up beneath the drag of his palms and Altair isn’t sure if he can give himself all the credit because of the friction that comes with clothes, but he feels he’s not allowed to go for hidden skin so he doesn’t steal under the tunic, and though his grabby fingers occasionally rake over handfuls of skin along Malik’s upper tights, he’s skirting the joining of his thigh or crotch altogether.

Altair has glanced down Malik’s shoulder, has spotted the lump straining at the front of his breeches, has noticed his tumbling and tottering pulse.

Progress is secure in small increments and Altair now knows that it’s not his place to initiate anything too racy.

What he can’t resist is busying his mouth. He stoops over the join of Malik’s neck and shoulder, grazes the skin with his teeth and upper lip. Malik jolts up, heaves a breath, shifts. It takes Altair less than an instance to act when the spot is bared for him with a tilt of head and a drop of shoulder. He starts outwards, at the outskirts of the neckline, working his way down the shoulder with precision—as far as the stretch of the neckline allows it—his kisses little more than pecks, softer and sweeter than the rough, deliberate sweeps of his hands working steadily on Malik’s front.

Altair inches through the criss-cross seams holding the plunge-line of Malik’s tunic together to loosen the lacing and free the rest of his shoulder, and then can’t interrupt the slow slide of his hands over Malik’s skin as he glides under through the rest of the lacing and rolls the nearest nipple between fingertips. Beneath his lips it feels as if Malik’s veins are swelled with arousal and his pulse tripping over itself. Then there’s a movement, and Malik is suddenly grinding back against his crotch in a manner utterly intuitive and shameless, as if he wants cock here and now.

Altair pushes into it until he has Malik’s pelvis trapped to the kitchen counter, to cease the friction he can’t handle right now.

By the time he has climbed his way back up Malik’s shoulder, Altair is particularly aware of how Malik’s mouth is parted and parched from labored breaths, and the rag in his motionless hands is oozing suds into the puddle of water in the lavabo. He has forgotten himself. It will take so little to angle his chin sideways and engage his mouth in a kiss.

When Altair is barely halfway through this intention, Malik tilts his head away, denying Altair his face.

“You are not permitted to kiss,” Malik puffs up at him, and it sounds so bizarre while Altair has a nipple between his fingers and his erection squeezed against Malik’s ass and they’re breathing same air.

This rejection stings for a moment, before Altair quickly recognizes it as a tease.

It’s all good. Malik’s mood is tractable, easy to bend.

“Alright,” he concedes while hooking a knuckle beneath Malik’s chin again to pull him back in, “And this?”

An innocuous peck on the cheek.

“Yes,” Malik sanctions, and adds, “Occasionally.”

“And this?” Altair persists, flattening lips to the corner of a dark brow.

There is an instant when Malik’s eyes fall close and he nods in response, quickly mellowing out.

“And this…?” he trails off, peppering chaste pecks. Cheekbone, eyelid, brow, bridge of nose, temple, forehead, cheek—a recurring, circular, irregular mapping of Malik’s face. Until his syrupy affection starts to act as a funnel for the tide of something bolder, and Malik suddenly startles his skin with wetness while seizing him by the nape to join their lips.

It’s a joy, knowing that Malik has felt a craving so profound that he had to initiate it to get Altair’s mouth on his own.

But it’s a joy short-lived.

Rauf’s attention-seeking fake cough breaks their join of lips in its most auspicious moment, just when Malik is parting his mouth to hint that he’s on the cusp of allowing the kiss to deepen. Malik’s mood shatters like a broken plate, his pleasure halved by the surprise of finding Rauf watching them from the mouth of the kitchen with his emptied breakfast bowl in hand. The fire in Malik burns too bright: it burns out too quick and turns into an ashy cold and is long gone by the time Altair’s warmed up completely.

“I—uh, I’ll go fetch Leonardo,” Malik stammers out, visibly flustered, and spirits himself away in a matter of moments.

Altair doesn’t budge from the spot he’s been abandoned at even as Rauf wobbles into the kitchen and smartly slots his damned bowl inside another one that’s already awaiting its wash.

“Didn’t mean to interrupt,” he remarks after Altair’s nasty glare calls for some form of acknowledgement.

“If you didn’t mean it then don’t interrupt.”

“I seek no quarrel,” Rauf beams good-naturedly, keeping his palms up in surrender or peace-offering, neither of which are taken up by Altair even after an expectant pause.

“Oh well. I understand. The only thing worse than not getting what you want is getting what you want, eh?”

Altair watches him wobble out of the kitchen and doesn’t appreciate one bit of the man’s earthy humor, or the fact that he’s forced to house a fugitive in his home when his husband is finally opening up to him.

 

* * *

 

By the time they’ve uncoiled half of Rauf’s back, Altair is beginning to realize that something’s not right.

“What’s wrong?” he asks, curious.

“It’s healing remarkably well…” Leonardo exclaims tonelessly while assessing Rauf’s back. Equally awed, Malik is peeling off the rest of bandages, their insides starched with old blood. Soon the extent of healing is apparent to Altair as well as he chances a look while trying not to appear too disrespectful in his nosiness, and their joint sentiment of awe is suddenly eddying about the room. The flesh that’s been sutured only hours before looks like it’s sealing and growing together rapidly, with no signs of infection.

“It’s because I pray to them devoutly. They deliver me from pain and enemies,” Rauf beams, addressing the amazement currently piled behind his back while they continue to marvel at the state of his wounds.

“Barzel and [Ya’ar](http://the-king-of-novices.tumblr.com/post/114871631011/live-forever-or-die-trying-the-pantheon-610)?” Leonardo assumes naturally, as the god of forest happens to be the god of healing as well, and praying to a god that even the city hospital is dedicated to seems sensible to everyone.

“[Hiba](http://the-king-of-novices.tumblr.com/post/105028879746/live-forever-or-die-trying-the-pantheon-310),” Rauf corrects.

Altair turns his head to swap puzzled faces with Malik but he exchanges looks with Leonardo instead and Malik doesn’t appear nearly as mystified.

“It makes sense. Hiba did heal the island in Ya’ar’s absence,” Malik reminds of what they all already know and removes the last of the blood-caked bandage. It doesn’t make sense to Altair, but he recalls that he and Desmond had stumbled into Rauf’s forge in the midst of his prayer and Altair distinctly remembers the sachet of prayer sand hanging off Rauf’s neck like a necklace. It does makes sense to pray to Barzel, the goddess of war, for delivery from enemies, but it makes no sense to expect Hiba to heal upon prayer when people traditionally pray to Ya’ar for health.

It makes no sense that a peace-loving, meek god would get rid of one’s enemies.

 

* * *

 

But it does.

By mid-morning, the city is brewing with stories of what had occurred at the temple last night. The rumor is told and retold, stripped of details and embellished, exaggerated and correct—but none of them doubt divine intervention.

The mercenaries who had guarded Rauf yesterday—the three men that they have fooled last night—have dropped dead.

Four people in total, including the man who had delivered the lashes.

When Claudia brings the news of this, for the shortest of moments Altair finds himself amazed enough to suspect that these four men were slain by her own hand after they’d parted. When his astonishment wears off the thought of this becomes ludicrous, since Claudia herself had been adamant about avoiding the unnecessary spilling of blood. It can’t be her, and no one else seems to think this when she shares her findings with them during her quick check-up on Rauf.

 _They deliver me from pain and enemies_ begins to ring through Altair’s head like a tinnitus, a warning to never make a man with such powerful patrons his enemy.

 

* * *

 

Leonardo is too immersed in thoughts to notice it at first.

It takes several walks around the studio and turning two herb shelves inside out in search of medicines for Rauf before he spots the novelty he’s had no part in.

On one of the least messy tables lies a sea shell. Not one of those one finds washed-up on beaches, but a large, pretty one you’d find at some fancy artisan shop at Barzel’s market. Leonardo often forgets what’s stashed away in the many corners of his little establishment, but he can recognize every item upon seeing it again, and this particular shell is beyond doubt not his possession.

Salai is, much to his displeasure, still staying with her new lover, and Leonardo doesn’t feel like he’s imposing on something that’s meant for someone else as he picks the sea shell up for inspection. It’s a thick and heavy trumpet shell, with a chestnut hue interrupting the otherwise creamy-white of its back. He’s thumbing over its ribbed hull when a tiny scroll of parchment slips from its hollow, dropping onto the desk.

There’s a message scribbled on it.

_In the pond I made for a blond, a message waits for him to respond._

The identity of the writer stirs him up like a knock on the door before he suddenly convulses with a silent laughter, then breaks out laughing. He hasn’t had such a good laugh in a long time.

In the courtyard garden where Ezio had dug the pond for the Water Blossom, he finds another sea shell, smaller, pink-lipped and sitting atop one of the thick floating leaves. In this one there is also a message scribbled on a minuscule scroll tucked inside into the shell and it takes more skill to extract it.

_Down the stairs, your answer awaits._

Leonardo looks up and around, traverses the whole courtyard looking for signs of Ezio’s presence, and, finding none, he exits the tunnel with his curiosity piqued and swerves right to descend down the hill. At the foot of the hill and the join of the main road he is approached by a street vendor who entrusts him another, though emptier, sea shell (a task for which he had most probably been paid for) and directs him to the next point of this scavenger hunt arranged by Ezio.

 

* * *

 

Several hours and an armful of sea shells later, with half the city below his feet, Leonardo finds the prize at the end.

The beach smells like Ezio.

Waves and salt, misty air, a well-rounded sandy, briny scent.

They are alone. Ezio’s made sure to choose a seldom visited beach. Overhead, papery downy clouds cloak the sky into a velvety azure. Ahead, Ezio is sitting on a spread blanket, close to where the ocean spume is petting sand. He’s looking his handsomest, with his hair combed to perfection and tied into a smart ponytail with a luscious red ribbon, smelling of scent, dressed in a double-breasted brocade shirt, and making Leonardo feel severely under-dressed for the occasion. He has nothing with him but empty, shell-filled hands and dark circles under his eyes.

He seats himself in the gap between Ezio and silver trays heaped with candied fruit and sweetmeats, arranges the collected sea shells at his feet into a neat pile. Ezio greets him with silence and a smile which glistens with something innocent and soaks Leonardo with a strange lightness in his heart.

They are alone, except for the ship that’s just a dot on the horizon and the boat that’s impelled towards the shore by the tide.

They sit motionless like that for a few moments.

“You could have just asked me out,” Leonardo points out, neither flattered nor displeased by this sugary gesture.

“I thought it might be a pleasant surprise,” Ezio admits, merging the handsome smile with a handsome tone, then reaching out and grazing a fingertip along Leonardo’s forehead to tuck away a lock of hair fallen over a golden eyebrow.

Leonardo suspects there’s more to this than just the gesture. He feels as if Ezio, seeing the plethora of his interests and skills, has found himself feeling somewhat inferior and is subsequently trying to compensate by putting enough thought into tricks like these to both make himself appear more worthwhile and to show that he can stimulate Leonardo on an intellectual level. And while Leonardo finds it an utter joke, it doesn’t cross his mind to complain or downplay the effort Ezio has put into this.

He can’t remember the last time someone put this much effort into making himself look more appealing to him.   

He’s walking into a black hole; tumbling right down into its abyss. Altair had warned him, too. And he’s not dumb, but he suffers a loss of strength in Ezio’s presence, he’s weak enough that he can’t help himself, and this inner uprising he attributes to the fact that he hasn’t loved like this in a long time.

What he feels for Ezio is altogether different, and similar to the last time he had touched him. It’s in the pit of his stomach, and it’s painful hot. He doesn’t like when his belly burns when there’s risk involved, when it’s searing and hungering as he hungers for this man. He hates it when he has no control over it and the feeling simply ravages through him and _wants_. And it wants Ezio.

When Leonardo turns to push him down there’s something frightful in its beauty and something beautiful in its frightfulness.

It’s still there when Leonardo backs him into a sand-softened ground and kisses him, kisses him deeper, until he’s gotten his hands under the loosened shirt and bared Ezio’s sides, until he’s wrinkled every neat fold of his posh clothes, until Ezio’s face is heat-flushed and they’re a beastly tangle of limbs on a small blanket.

 

* * *

 

This time, the handles give way to his pressure and the door shifts on its hinge.

Before now Desmond had never set foot inside this chamber. He doesn’t push on the door, leaving a chink of space just enough to fit through, doesn’t announce his presence.

Lucy’s chamber is so saturated by red that it’s become what defines it. The thick carpets that muffle his steps are a deep crimson. The furniture he passes on his way to the unsuspecting figure is all redwood: the bookshelves densely populated with books and scrolls; the wainscoting running along the walls; the polished writing desk deserted except for the sheet of foolscap littered with some gold and foreign coins spilling from a pouch and a small muslin bag of violet sweets—all of which send Desmond into a moment of struggle with the temptation to examine closer both bundles; the auburn-hued leather divan sprawling at the back of the room, half in shade, cut diagonally by the limit of light emanating from within the concealed, massive bed.

For an instant Desmond is fooled into thinking that even the light itself is red, but as he draws to the foot of the bed he finds that it has borrowed its color by filtering through the folds and ripples of the canopy hanging over the bed, feigning a soft vermilion.

By far the most impressive red is the dragon.

Long-bodied and fierce-looking, carved into the wood of the bed, it keeps winding along the canopy as if it’s headed somewhere, occasionally touching the massive corbels with its back where the body curves into a coil, before its head plunges into a descend down one of the wooden corners, towards the mattress.

Desmond follows the dragon with his gaze as if it’s the pulse of the room, until it leads him to its very heart, lying alone there on the veiled bed.

She doesn’t sense his presence even as he hooks a finger into a fold of the canopy to pull it aside and reveal her entirely, lolled on her belly and scanning through a scroll, her silken robe unbelted and doing a poor job of covering anything past her upper thighs. Even with a few moments of inspection Desmond can conclude that Lucy has a habit of curling-then-uncurling her bare toes while deep in thought, since she insists on absentmindedly doing this during the light sway of her bent legs which she keeps joined by hooked ankles. Amused and inspired by this curious habit, Desmond opts for revealing himself by grazing the tip of his finger across the sole of her foot.

She twists around before she stiffens up, alert.

She is nude under her robes, and barely minding it once the recognition on her face slumps her tensed shoulders into relief.  She isn’t punitive about his rejection of her yesterday’s invitation. Nor does a sentiment of protest seep into her expression as she examines him. Oddly, almost endearingly, a look passes across her face that looks like the summation of all the treasures they have collected together so far, and she looks pleased to see him. She rolls over, assuming her earlier position, a smirk lurking around the corner of her mouth as she curls the scroll close and uncurls her toes, this time deliberately, teasingly.

They share a silence and Desmond revels in the emotion of being accepted so easily.

“I could have been an assassin,” he speculates and covers the distance from her toes to her heel with the pad of his finger, finding the touch welcome.

“I would have sensed you had you been just an assassin. You’re more than that.”

Standing there, Desmond feels a tide of three consecutive moods surging within him—a tenderness at the depth of her view where others’ is myopic, the arousal at the sight of her hair coming down in glossy lanks over her freshly bared shoulder, a sting of displeasure that harks back to her speech at the temple.

“So you’re a prophet now?”

Voicing this muted scorn reminds him suddenly of Sheker who first changed her wings from a dragon’s scales to a bird’s feather to trick [Gdila](http://the-king-of-novices.tumblr.com/post/104486350666/live-forever-or-die-trying-the-pantheon-210) into believing they’re from the same lands, that Ga’ash is their god.

“I am what I need to be. For the good of this city.”

“And what is it this city needs that it already doesn’t have?”

“Order and peace,” she recites without ado, like a long-rehearsed phrase she has learned to believe, and Desmond loathes the answer not because he disagrees with it, but because from her mouth it sounds like a belief borrowed from another creator and is, in essence, not her.

“Peace, yes. But free of order knit from lies.”

“What’s freedom without order,” she states without asking a question.

“I cannot agree.”

“We don’t have to. You and I like to compromise, do we not?”

“On good days,” he drawls, with an uncivil amount of arousal oozing from his voice as he discards the idea of going deeper into the topic and his body surrenders to the tide of lust in him.

“Well then. Do something good by putting your mouth to good use…” she responds with mirrored sentiment, recognizing the intent in him, and as she turns to look at him for the first time, as she throws a glance over her shoulder, her cheeks are stained with a beautiful dusting of red and two bright eyes basking in blue lunacy behind when she parts her knees across the mattress to open up for him.

His shirt is off before he even makes it onto the bed.

 

* * *

 

The bulk of the day Altair largely spends outside, careening from one job to the next.

It starts with the simple but overdue task of cleaning Malik’s prized carpet, the one he’s spoiled with the assortment of expensive liquids and scented oils he still has to replace as reparation costs of his pissy fit. He never intends to enlist help, but a handful of community members loitering around the courtyard gather to help him roll out the carpet along the showers floor. His scrubbing merges halfway down into a joint effort, a whirlwind of communal chat, laughter, and shared work.

The outcome of receiving help is meandering from this chore to another to return to those who had helped with equal kindness, and though a good portion of his day has by the evening been spent on this, Altair doesn’t mind it. For the first time since his return he is starting to feel this community as a _we_ , not _them_.

He doesn’t get to see Malik much throughout the day, but his own chores are a vain attempt at trying to top Malik’s productivity. By the time Altair’s returned upstairs for a third meal, Malik has managed to do every possible job Altair can think of, from washing a heap of clothes and making dinner for three starving men to drawing two ordered city maps (the count that Altair officially had time to follow) and weaving an entire death-catcher from the scratch.

Rauf, constrained by the boundaries of their home, hasn’t done much beyond rest and sleep.

By nightfall, no search party has passed through their community, or any other community on the hill, and Altair assumes that Al Mualim hasn’t launched an public search while the confusion over mercenary deaths is still fresh.

For tonight, at least, they will be outside the scope of danger, even with a fugitive slumbering on their sofa as they go to bed together that night.

He is denied Malik’s hand.

Malik had slipped into the bed before him, has fallen asleep on his side, facing away from Altair’s half of bed. With the memory of Malik’s kitchen slip-up fresh in mind, Altair blames this on fatigue. Rather than forgetting, Malik must have drifted off before remembering to offer Altair the hand he relies on for peaceful sleep. For a whole hour he keeps dozing on and off, hoping that Malik might roll over in his sleep and give him the opportunity to draw the hand nearer to himself. What happens instead catches him unawares, knocking down all trace of drowsiness.

“Altair?”

It’s a whisper, testing him for awareness.

“Yes?”

Their conversation is an exchange of breaths and whispers, mandated by the hum of sleep coming from the neighboring room. There’s a long stretch of silence and no movement, and two awake, confused people breathing in near-darkness.

The pause runs on for so long that it tricks Altair into assuming that Malik has simply wanted to assure himself that Altair is there before surrendering to sleep once again.

And then, when he thinks his confusion has reached its peak, Malik’s whisper breaks the quiet.

“Can—…”

“Yes?” Altair prods him right after this broken fragment of a question, to goad him on.

“Can you… touch me again…?”

His voice, already muted, is nearly smothered by fluster and blush.

Altair’s body lies limp like a rag-doll, but the center of his chest is burning up, his face positively aflame with a grinning smile. It’s unethical, but he allows a moment of suspense to enjoy Malik’s torment.

“I thought you didn’t want that from someone you hate.”

“I don’t. But my body and I seem to be in a disagreement,” he admits this without a stutter, candidly.

“So whose instructions do I follow? Yours or your body’s?”

An answer doesn’t come.

He expects Malik to move at least, but he doesn’t budge in the slightest.

“Come closer,” he instructs, stubborn in his desire to discover the limits of how far Malik is willing to go for the things he wants.

As if unable to look at him, Malik launches into a slow and laborious reverse sliding along the mattress without upsetting the position he’s taken. And with his back turned to Altair, he inches himself into the man’s chest.

As soon as he is enveloped into a hold by a pair of awaiting arms, everything feels warm again.

Malik has never felt so warm in his own bed. And there is nothing sentimental about it: Altair is a breathing furnace, his body a ceaseless source of heat. He can’t recount how many times he had lain in bed ice-cold and freezing in wintry seasons when he didn’t have any firewood, after Altair’s war pay stopped coming. Altair’s hand is so warm that when it steals up Malik’s nightgown it’s no shock to his skin, but it’s a jolt to his groin. A jolt that hops instantly into his belly to establish itself there and spread out to the rest of his body like roots. His body launches into a squirm, a twisting in anticipation of pleasure.

Altair’s fist wraps itself around his cock in a gentle, testing hold, and Altair isn’t astonished to find him hard. He inevitably takes a certain amount of pride in his craft when a mere handful of deliberate pumps deliver him a writhing body whose heart is kicking against the chest as if the pulse itself is racing for its life. He doesn’t need to solicit a feedback. Malik’s stuttering breath and hips rolling against him with the pace of his stroking tells him that his pressure is right, that Malik won’t last long.

“I can make you feel better,” he rasps into Malik’s ear, keen on keeping him there for a while longer.

“I don’t want sex.”

“Not that.”

Altair had figured a while back that Malik hasn’t yet ripened for penetration. Even without the many obstacles he wouldn’t attempt that now. He is too restricted to even try to think of anything except pleasing Malik. He retreats, releasing him, just enough to sit up on his haunches and shift to a comfortable spot between Malik’s legs. There’s some stiffness in Malik’s body while Altair rolls him onto the back and lifts his thighs up by pushing at the back of his knees, but he issues no protest as Altair rearranges their limbs so that he is lying belly-down with his head hovering over Malik’s bare crotch, propped onto elbows with hands holding Malik’s thighs apart.

“Relax,” Altair whispers up Malik’s belly when he finds that his body is still too taut to work with.

There’s a squirm and a shift, Malik pulls his calves up to dig heels into Altair’s back and find some purchase there—the only sensible thing he can do while Altair keeps him spread and open like this—but fails miserably to meet the demand.

“Relax, we’ve done this.”

 “I _can’t_.”

“Of course you can.”

Malik huffs out and sounds beyond frustrated. He fumbles with the useless folds of his nightgown pulling the rim neck-high and struggles with where to put his hands, and does nothing to ease off the stiffness that Altair feels in his body even with the engorged cock resting across his belly.

“ _How_?”

“I won’t instruct you on how to relax,” he deadpans.

It might be because of a third presence in their home. It might be because there’s no border between the rooms. It might be that he’s on edge thanks to this vulnerable position. It might be all of these things, or none of them. 

Altair’s head veers off sideways to nuzzle down the softest, plumpest stretch of Malik’s inner thigh with the tip of his nose; to flatten wet lips into its supplest spots; to descend with smacking kisses down to the straining tendon where his inner thigh is joining into his crotch. Until Malik’s hands have reached for his head, until he’s fluffing up and smoothing down handfuls of hair, until his body is finally loosening up.

“Good,” he murmurs between wet, open-mouthed pecks.

He has a goal in mind and wetting his fingers with saliva isn’t it. Not since he’s realized that Malik won’t relax enough for any sort of penetration. Altair’s mouth advances up the crease between his torso and thigh instead, and then encroaches on a territory he hasn’t crossed till now, not like this. With a flattened tongue, he laps up the entire length of his shaft and this broad, sloppy lick immediately puts Malik’s arousal through the roof. A sharp breath, interrupted, a fistful of hair, the spasm of hips, the solitary light of one oil-lamp all convince Altair that he has neither the time nor proper setting to make this seductive or slow.

He takes a deep breath before Malik can catch his intention, hooks his hands in the bend of Malik’s lifted thighs to steady him, and takes him into his mouth.

Malik’s moan is slow and long before his brain bridges the gap to caution and sacrifices a fistful of Altair’s hair to clasp a hand over his own mouth while yielding to a mouth that’s hot and wet and not at all hesitant. He feels the warmest, smoothest velvet envelop the head of his cock and cants his hips up into a helpless roll when Altair leans into him and sheathes the rest of his length into the most blissful, back-arching, toe-curling heat.

Altair pauses briefly to adjust to the intrusion.

His gag reflex is not overactive and he desperately wants Malik to come inside him. With these in mind, Altair unhooks his restraining grip from Malik’s hips to let him decide how deep he wants his cock to go into his mouth. Malik thrusts up the instance he’s released, and it’s no good.

It’s no good, and he can’t fathom why he’s never repulsed by allowing Altair access to his body. Putting anyone else in Altair’s place in his mind’s vision makes him sick to the stomach. No amount of perusal can shed light on why he opens up to Altair in the basest ways but stiffens up at the thought of someone else replacing him in this.

It’s no good, but he heedlessly bucks into the cadenced sucking of Altair’s mouth that’s so good to him. His jaw is pleasure-slackened, his mouth agape in frozen breathlessness, both hands raking over a bobbing skull and cock fucking into a humming mouth. He’s heavy with lust but Altair is more.

He catches the rhythm Malik has imposed on him and eagerly weathers the weight of his cock bucking into him. This method of tyranny he can appreciate. He submits his mouth to Malik even when he’s going too fast or too deep, his tongue works at him in swipes, feeling out his shape as he goes down on him. Altair doesn’t suppress him even when the hands in his hair pull too rough and he starts thrusting up in complete abandon. It won’t last long and that’s the saddest part; Malik is tottering on the brink of his limits and Altair is acutely aware of how his breaths are coming shallower and shorter.

He arrives at his limit wordlessly, silently, with a couple shuddering spasms as he empties his seed deeper inside Altair’s throat than Altair himself had expected he can take, and Altair won’t voice it but he wants to be on his knees every day for Malik.

Malik’s hands remain on the back of his head even after he collapses into a state of sedation with limbs slumped in afterglow. Presently his mind sleeps, but Altair makes use of this refractory pause to give his own numbed mouth a break and perhaps to achieve a certain secret liaison with Malik’s slack body on his way up to his face. His lips start at the juncture, the tendon between his inner thigh and groin, nipping at it, smooching his way wetly up Malik’s body for his own pleasure, sucking in mouthfuls of skin where he finds it supple and leaving marks that can only be seen in the absence of clothes.

From cock to neck, all the way up to his stirring face he travels with his mouth alone, before he settles for looming over Malik’s lips.

“Am I permitted now?” he asks full of hope, half-expecting Malik to be inured to kissing by now.

“No.”

When there’s no comic relief to spot in the pitch of his whisper and Malik’s face looks sapped of this morning’s humor, Altair suspects that something’s not quite right.

“I make you come and all I demand is a kiss?”

“ _’Demand’_?” Malik sneers up at him, watching him askance. Anger glints in his eyes. He rips from Altair’s embrace and rolls off to the side while tugging his nightgown down and struggling with this simple task of covering himself.

“Was it the way I worded it that offended you?” Altair pleads with a crestfallen face and his insides collapse into a void, a weakening, and he wishes they could speak beyond hushed whispers, “You demanded to be touched, I only wanted a kiss—“

 “I did _not_ demand—”

”Of _course_ you did,” he butts in, a measure angry himself.

Malik growls hostilely, a childish indignation in lieu of a sound argument and proper defense, and then turns away facing off with his back walling the gap between them like a citadel.

Without the least hope of success but a straining erection to deal with and frustration that quickly branches off into something vengeful, Altair slumps onto his back and starts touching himself quite soundly, with the intent to irritate the silence out of Malik.

“Stop that,” the warning flies over Malik’s shoulder.

“No.”

“ _Stop_ it.”

“Make me.”

Piqued, Malik spins around, bowls over the mattress before flinging a punch at Altair’s shoulder, and Altair has never, _never_ , received such a vain and puny hit. He chuckles at Malik’s half-hearted attempt without taking his stroking hand off his cock, inviting a second hit to his shoulder. This hit quickly turns into another, a meaty slap across the chest, at which point Altair interferes, though not from pain.

He seizes Malik’s open hand by the wrist in mid-attempt, holds it up between them, his grip tight and painful. A moment after nothing happens he loosens up, glides his thumb up and over the bend of his wrist to cushion it in the softest part of Malik’s palm soothingly. He brings the hand lower, probing it for resistance, and guides it down to his cock, beneath the tented sheet suspended by his raised knees.

Malik is mouse-quiet and breathing into the side of his neck, but smitten with curiosity. His sham anger falls flat on its face and his body eases into compliance when Altair cups the back of his hand and molds Malik’s fingers around his girth with his own. A trickle of pre-come dribbles out and then right into Malik’s palm as he drags the grip up the underside of Altair’s length, smoothing his movement. He doesn’t cease his ministrations when Altair’s hand leaves him, and Altair pulls back entirely, letting this new domesticated creature work his cock on his own.

“You didn’t want to kiss me only moments before but now you’re stroking my cock. Is a kiss worse than that?” he rasps through a foggy cloud of arousal.

Malik replies with no word and a tightened fist, morphing his grip into a temporary punitive vice and getting a pained moan as repentance.

“Alright, I take it back,” Altair gasps, and gasps again when Malik’s thumb starts to pet around his cockhead in slow, firm circles with the pad of his finger as a tacit apology for the too-tight grip. He doesn’t want to talk during this exploration and that’s fine with Altair. As long as he continues touching him and breathing hotly into his neck, he is willing to be quiet for Malik’s comfort and overlook the lack of finesse in his skill. He hasn’t touched anyone before. Altair should never have doubted his sincerity about his chastity.

He is willing to be quiet.

Until the struggle in Malik’s endeavor is difficult to disregard.

“Do you need assistance?” he whispers, tilting his head to the side and nearly touching their foreheads, and Malik gives a nod.

Altair’s hand is on his in a blink, steering his fist to the root of his shaft, shepherding his hold into a firmer clasp, launching into a fast stroke with just the right pacing until Malik has attuned himself to the pattern.

“I love it when you touch me,” he whispers into Malik’s ear when the gusts of breath on his neck have ceased and Malik is looking down his body instead, “I crave your touch like you crave mine.”

“I don’t crave your touch,” the mumble comes.

“Clearly explains your earlier demands,” he butts in with a quip that his lust-addled brain allows him in a moment of poor judgment and receives another punishment in the form of a constrictive grip round his cock. What Malik fails to realize in this botched attempt at chastisement is that his pressure this time adds just the right touch of roughness to please Altair’s peculiar taste, and Altair responds to it with a moan and a buck into his tightened fist.

It affects Malik immediately, lodges a stab of excitement into his belly like a knife.

Dominating the tremor of his hand, he continues with short strokes at the thickest part of Altair’s cock, like he’s been shown, gradually making them longer, without loosening this grip even when his hand tingles numb. It’s worth it, the way in which Altair plummets into a chasm of pleasure and his head tips back helplessly. His face is glossed with a patina of sweat and laced with contorted bliss, but it only adds to the perfect balance of his features, the sharpness of his jaw, the straightness of his nose, the slickness of his lips, the thickness of long lashes veiling his closed eyes.

For a moment there’s nothing but the thickness of Altair’s cock in his hand and the crease of that bliss stuck between his brows and the same distracting brassy shade of skin glowing in dim lamplight.

He feels the stab twist, feels something inside him tighten and wane with each little snap of Altair’s hips and every moan he has to stifle.

He can’t marshal his thoughts and his brain just—stops.

When he suddenly lifts himself up, Altair’s eyes fly open once he finds his mouth sealed by Malik’s, feels the hot slide of Malik’s tongue down his own. Somewhat nonplussed at first, he reaches up to snatch him by the nape and join their lips tighter, to muffle the moan that escapes him as he meets his apex and spills down the hand that’s holding him.

Malik has expressed his craving by initiating what he’d denied earlier, while Altair hadn’t been sure who of them two Malik is punishing for wanting this, and Altair incontinently expresses his own by holding him down by the neck to deepen the kiss and feast himself full of Malik while he’s offered the chance.

“What do you want now?” Malik asks when they’re breathless and Altair’s golden eyes are half-closed and warm with something no defeat can interrupt.

“I want to have my husband. I want my arms to be full of you when I wake up. I want my seven years of sacrifice to be more than just following orders. I want my time in war to have a purpose, and I want your respect and... your love, when I’m worthy enough of it.”

“My respect is earned, not purchased by being an obedient slave to a tyrant.”

“How do I earn it then?”

“I don’t know...” he trails off and watches the warmth in Altair’s eyes flutter off into something that’s yearning.

 _By offering the security I never received_ is what he means.

 _By being the husband I never had_ is what he thinks.

 _By becoming the family I once lost_ is what he hopes.

 

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Why do I always end chapters with some emotional shizz... Anyway, that blowjob position was basically [this](http://picgur.org/afterdark/image/9zD) (nsfw-ish). 
> 
> You know Malik is an inexperienced teen when he thinks that sex = penetration, that silly boy...


	15. Chapter 13

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> This story isn’t dead.
> 
> But since the last time I updated, I battled acute bronchitis for three months, I had two near-death experiences, I got a job, my boss attempted to rape me, and now I’m taking him to court and hoping that he won’t have me beaten or killed for “ruining” his career and marriage. I think all this kinda excuses my long absence. I’m doing well now, things could have been worse and I’m not complaining, but I wanted to write as much of this story as I can, in case something happens to me. There’s still so much I want to say.
> 
>  **A hearty hello to all new readers and old readers who still care about this story, and have fun reading** ❤

 

 

* * *

 

 

 “ _Announce_ yourself!?” Malik gawks about, deeply revolted by the proposition.

They’re all strewn around his living-room.

Claudia sits there leg over leg, watching Leonardo work on Rauf’s bandages. Across them, Altair is entertaining a child whose mother looms over Malik’s shoulders with her finger trotting idly along the outline of his ear while Malik sits pulping a fruit, with Desmond pacing behind their backs.

“That’s what I thought too,” Claudia chimes in, disregarding his cry of outrage.

“That might work,” Leonardo seconds eagerly, as if his opinion has been kept in a locked drawer until someone unbolted it.

“Agreed,” Mary agrees succinctly, leaving only Altair and Desmond opinionless. 

Aware that he holds no leverage or ultimatum against Desmond, Malik fixes his expectant stare on Altair who’s been trying his best to make himself invisible. Something akin to guilt punctures Malik’s gut at seeing how Talia has encircled half of Altair’s broad wrist with her tiny fingers, like a bracelet, and has huddled up to Altair as if she depends on him for warmth. Regret at having disturbed the serene image of a big warrior rocking a small child in his lap.

“Rauf can’t stay here forever,” Altair decides at last without looking him in the eye, “I don’t think he’d want to,” he adds in the same toneless voice that feigns common sense where more than rationality is involved.

They survey each other askance then, feeling that they are rivals in this matter.

A large disagreement across Malik’s face stands out like a birthmark, but, realizing that he is once again outnumbered, he emits a sibilant sigh of annoyance after the lengthy pause and evinces his disapproval of Rauf’s proposition by retreating from the conversation.

“I have it all figured out,” Claudia goes on, assuming a role of the spontaneous schemer despite the proposition being Rauf’s, “I’ve heard the rumors being bandied about regarding the lack of priests at the temple and around the city. You might have heard that there’s been quite an uproar because of it in some communities. Al Mualim’s sending out heralds with news of our priests being sent out to defeated lands, as _missionaries_.”

“What are missionaries?” Leonardo squeezes the question in and isn’t the only one to wonder.

“Heralds say it’s priests who travel to spread word of our gods and myths to other peoples.”

“To what purpose? They’re our gods, what’s that to do with others?” Leonardo’s sentiment is quickly passed around the room and shared among them.

“I’m no wiser than the next man. Something’s dodgy about the whole matter, if you ask me,” Claudia says and completes her remark with two meaningful looks aimed at the two warriors present in the room. They stare each other down, Claudia and the warriors. Altair palms the child’s back soothingly. Desmond doesn’t crack an expression or move. Altair feels as though the very air they exhale during this brief pause is indexed and filed away by her sharp-eyed gaze. It’s a private look amid a group conversation, one that neither Altair nor Desmond address since neither wants to reveal that they’d witnessed and nearly took part in the secret massacre of priests, lest they be plied with questions.

“How does people getting wind of the lack of priests help Rauf?” Malik prods her, oblivious to the accusatory stares being flung across the room, hopeful that his earlier protest might still increase in volume and volubility.

“His return to society would benefit Al Mualim. He’ll provide distraction from the predicament with priests.”

“It’s best if his announcement connects to rumors about the curse. He can claim he’s been abducted by the gods. That he’s then been shown light and the ‘proper path’, and that he’ll resume forging weapons as before. I imagine that’s what Al Mualim will demand of him,” Mary adds, subjecting the latter statement to Malik’s fault-finding but unvoiced opinion.

“Al Mualim could use a good god story now,” Claudia agrees with a conclusion that’s already been accepted by the majority, “As surely as the sun will rise in the east in the morning, Al Mualim will accept Rauf’s redemption story.”

“Unless it’s interminably cloudy,” Malik mumbles.

Altair thinks of Barzel.

Of how the pungent smell of strife had drawn this goddess of war to the island while [Nokem](http://the-king-of-novices.tumblr.com/post/104486337526/live-forever-or-die-trying-the-pantheon-110)’s human children were dying in battles against Ga’ash. Of how she crafted weapons for opposing sides, hoping to turn it into a war. Of how [Zikaron](http://the-king-of-novices.tumblr.com/post/119950551366/god-zikaron-patron-of-death-prophecies), to rebuff her chaos, halted death itself until she agreed to side with Nokem.

Altair thinks of this and wonders if Malik feels how Nokem must have felt. He is the only one to recognize that Malik doesn’t protest because his mind is simple, but because the thought of someone he cares about working for Al Mualim is unbearable.

 

* * *

 

 

It’s past noon when their home empties itself of guests and Malik dresses the table for dinner.

Tomorrow, Rauf will again belong to the city. Today, he’s still a refugee under Malik’s care.

Tomorrow, Altair will again have his husband to himself. Today, he still has to wear a cheap mask of hospitality whenever he catches Rauf smile, or the mere sight of his large expressive face, playful like fire.

“Doesn’t he have a lover who is missing him?” he throws the whisper as he slots himself alongside Malik at the kitchen counter and leaps in to cut a fresh loaf of bread—one of the few tasks he feels he’s qualified to do in a home that’s so miserably understaffed with only Malik hopping from chore to chore without delegating work.

“Rauf takes no lovers.”

“Oh,” says Altair, dumbfounded, “I see.”

A ripe silence.

Altair had heard of a handful warriors among the war ranks who never take lovers or express interest in intercourse. Or are very reserved about it. They’d caught his eye during his period of celibacy. He would never assume, though, that Rauf is of the kind who take no lovers to bed.

A quick smile passes his lips, a little bow of pleased acknowledgement. Then, in a sudden bout of daring fueled by the lack of competition, Altair gives Malik’s lower back a rub, causing him to straighten up like an erect lance. When his hand isn’t swatted away, he moves up over Malik’s hip and into the gentle curve of his waist and just below his armpit, and down again, digging his grip deeper into the supple flesh of Malik’s side.

Malik is taking sips from Altair’s petting and deciding what to allow.

His consent is silent and has no teeth. Still, speech-robed, reluctance gone, changed, unchanged, changed, thin, nostrils flared from a thrilled inhale, palms sitting on the edge of the counter, his fingers clasped, a little embarrassed. He is all at once. His gaze tilts up and sideways wavily, with a beaming glaze of arousal that leaves Altair entirely battered.

“Not in front of Rauf,” he breathes urgently up against Altair’s chin and Altair thinks of the curtain he had to put up between their bedroom and the living-room as a makeshift door-flap which Malik had insisted upon for the duration of Rauf’s stay.

At their side and far away, Rauf lounges on the sofa awaiting supper, no longer a threat in Altair’s mind.

“If that’s the only reason…” Altair trails off, suggestively, brazenly touching the tip of his nose to Malik’s in unison with a new stroke along his waist.

Malik squirms against the touch, and the way in which he allows his body’s movement to be shaped and sculpted by the firmness of Altair’s touch is altogether too inviting.

“ _And_ because you’re not permitted to touch,” Malik remembers belatedly, and there’s more bait than bite in the cadence of his whisper.

Altair meets this bait openmouthed, by teasing a touch beneath the rim of Malik’s tunic. A warm brush of a fingertip along a strip of skin in the unclothed gap where the tunic is now riding up, and Malik’s interest is ushered out.

His venture at petting is wholly dependent on Malik’s improved mood. A venture risked, a venture gained.

Altair gathers him closer and watches Malik fall in love with the daring beauty of his touch. Altair falls too; for Malik, again, and for the ease with which Malik wants to fall into a kiss by pretending that the gentle contact of their noses is an obstacle that he can dodge only by tilting his chin closer to Altair’s, and for the infatuation that Malik has for Altair’s initiations—so remote, so deeply buried within.

There’s a moment’s worth of distance between their lips when Rauf’s voice barges in from the living-room, and Altair can scarcely wait for this diversion of a man to be out of his home.

“I was thinking, I’ll need fresh clothes, too. “

Malik jolts out of Altair’s clasp in the blink of an eye, leaving Altair gladdened and disappointed that he’s swordless now, since he feels he would have chased the man out onto the streets if it weren’t for Malik acting like a barrier between them. Altair doesn’t like Malik playing the barrier because one side of him will always be facing Rauf.

“I’ll wash the ones you’re wearing. You can also borrow some of Altair’s,” Malik hazards the suggestion while populating the set table with food, already far, far away from Altair’s embrace. Malik’s abrupt dismissal upsets Altair even though he’d been prepared to see him changed at the smallest distraction.

“I want to be in my best garb when I announce myself to the city,” Rauf argues and Altair can’t decide if there’s a subtle poking of fun at his own clothes or if the man teases him constantly as some sort of repayment for that punch he has yet to apologize for. He feels compelled to answer with a glare as he’s leaving the kitchen with a basketful of bread he’d managed to cut up before his interrupted advances. One that Rauf embraces as though it were no different than a cordial smile.

Malik looks thoughtful for a moment, and then takes the plunge: “I can go and fetch you clothes from the forge.”

“I’ll go,” Altair butts in. He volunteers, not purely out of love, but because in the past few days he has discovered a boredom which is inseparable from being unemployed and not having full access to his husband.

“I’ll go with you,” Malik insists.

“You wield your blade well, but I’ve more experience and I don’t want you harmed.”

“We’re just picking up clothes, your protectiveness extends beyond reason. Besides, you owe me the toiletries you destroyed and I don’t trust you to fetch them without a guide.”

This shuts him up. What for the stab of remorse that comes with the reminder of his violent temper, what for the fact that Rauf is stealthily smirking at their marital spat. And there’s something objectively handsome when Rauf’s forehead, his nose, and even his large beautiful ears take part in the smile, and Altair wants to hide whatever is handsome in other men from Malik’s sight.

“You haven’t been to sword training in a while,” Rauf fills the gap of conversation while Malik is busy pouring a bowl of steaming stew for him and his well-developed zygomatic muscles rise along with his customary smile, rounding his tanned cheeks.

“I’ve been busy.”

“Finishing school?”

“Not yet. I might postpone it for the next season.”

“Most youth your age finishes school by now.”

“I know,” Malik admits and doesn’t sound annoyed by Rauf’s prodding nor provoked by his comparisons.

Altair is aware that he’s not yet fully conversant with the way Rauf and Malik talk to each other, but it’s obvious now more than ever that, in relation to his husband, Rauf sounds a lot like a well-meant mentor and nothing like a man sexually interested in Malik. Or anyone, for that matter.

 Altair is also aware that, in the grand scheme of things, he knows so very little of what Malik’s has been doing while he’s been away.

 

* * *

 

 

“So… you haven’t finished school yet?” Altair pretends to remember what hasn’t left his mind since its mention while they are passing [Ya’ar](http://the-king-of-novices.tumblr.com/post/114871631011/live-forever-or-die-trying-the-pantheon-610)’s academy on their way to Rauf’s forge and feels the flabbiness of the question he should have remembered to ask long ago.

“It’s not as bad as Rauf thinks. There’s only two courses to complete.”

“Which courses?”

“ _Sowing_ takes place once a year, as you know. The time was never right for me when the season began.”

“The sowing season isn’t far away. You could attend this time. I’ll take care of the househo—“

“You’re unemployed, Altair. Someone has to earn a living.”

“I’ll find work,” Altair insists with false pretenses of confidence and suffers a fleeting moment of utter powerlessness, but feels it intensify tenfold as he glances sideways to catch a glimpse of Malik’s face.

There’s a usual sight of students of all ages fluttering round the academy as they’re walking by, but they don’t recognize Malik and Malik doesn’t recognize them.  It must have been ages since Malik last attended the academy.

Altair had passed all his courses in due time, driven by the wish to join the ranks of warriors, though the nobles have always been the ones known to sprint though all courses with ease—partly for the leisure that they owed to their family wealth and partly for being considered superior in a variety of skills compared to the common man. Altair is certain that Malik would have completed school by now had he not been forced to earn his living in Altair’s absence.

He walks alongside Malik quiet but his feet and gut are oddly bloated with guilt. The academy rises taller than Altair seems to remember, as if to remind him of what Malik might have had, had he wedded into a more nurturing marriage.

“And the second one?” Altair asks when he can’t stand the thought of somehow being the one to blame for restricting Malik’s opportunities.

Malik fills the next silence with a jittery swallow, then a sigh, and looks as though he no longer wants to dwell on the subject.

“ _Sexuality_ ,” he utters with an artificial voice without lifting his stare from the cobblestones even once during the ensuing pause.

“Strange how they didn’t make you take it simply for being married,” Altair muses aloud after he has obviously regarded the answer with seriousness.

“I told them you were dead and I had no intentions of remarrying. They allowed me to postpone it.”

They don’t speak the rest of the way.

Behind them, the academy soars high to dwarf the narrow land-bridge connecting the peninsula of commoners to the land of nobles who no longer exist. The grand structure towers over the milling students like a massive amphitheater with colossal reliefs of the myth sewn into the shimmering stone of its arcaded, winding facade; like a community of its own; like a great equalizer between rich and poor, noble and common, where different children come under a single roof and leave with equal opportunities. Like something denied to Malik.

 

* * *

 

 

Their very walk through the entrance tunnel isn’t uneventful.

At the inner lip of the tunnel, Altair recognizes a burly man in distinct foreign attire as a mercenary exiting Barzel’s market and pulls Malik off their intended swerve leftwards, where the blacksmith corridor is situated. Malik allows himself to be pulled aside, off the path where people have fused into a walking stream circling the statue.

Four mercenary guards are blocking the passage to the blacksmith corridor like widely-spaced lampposts with a sinister look about them, several more are orbiting the statue, undaunted by the gap that the streaming river of citizens has formed around them. They must have been looking for Rauf for hours on end, since his very disappearance.

“We won’t get past them undetected,” Altair estimates after a quick survey of the unpopulated area behind the four mercenaries, where the number of customers has been severely thinned owing to their presence. He’s far from willing to start a fight over some guy’s clothes and also aware that triggering a fight would be superficial, careless, and shortsighted, but he can’t help but think that he’d take on every mercenary on his own if Malik wished it so and would account it a privilege to serve him.

“Let’s restore the goods you owe me,“ Malik orders rather than suggests, and doesn’t appear to be in a confrontational mood either. Altair can rally behind that sentiment. He’d rather do errands with him than cause trouble for little to no reason.

Malik sets off first and, unlike Altair, he knows exactly which corridor they’re headed for. They start a slow crawl through the crowds which seem to have congregated thicker inside the unguarded corridors as if to compensate for the trimmed space, and Altair stations himself at Malik’s side without allowing the bevy to intervene with their physical closeness as they trudge through.

They are deluged by the usual din of a bustling market, until they reach the quiet shops at the tail of the corridor which passionately smells of subtle perfumes, silken oils, sticky wax, smooth velvet passing from hand to hand, and powdery bath-salts slipping through dry fingers.

The shops are homely, feebly-lighted by the blazoning wall-lamps which walk their speckled penumbras across the displayed wares, but all aglow from within.

While most onlookers wander in and out aimlessly, Malik keeps heading for particular shops with clear goals inscribed into his mind. While it’s difficult for the usual customer to circumnavigate the temptation of haggling, Malik strides resolutely out of shops whose wares fail to please his demanding tastes even when he’s offered discount. Some merchants recognize him, none recognize Altair, and the warrior feels severely out of place trudging through this repository of lavishness that reminds him of the pomp of city baths that he has no deep knowledge of.

Malik looks exceptionally peaceful and focused and Altair wonders if he’s witnessing him in another one of his natural habitats where a parentless, husbandless boy has groomed his bargaining skills and sharpened his judgment while growing up unattended.

Altair’s duty consists solely of following Malik around with a shoulder satchel that Malik had him bring along for the sole purpose of carrying purchased goods and storing whatever is handed to him inside, and his role as a customer is purely perfunctory, since he’s helplessly unfamiliar with what exactly he had spilled and shattered during his jealousy-induced demolition.

Malik isn’t liberal in the spending of Altair’s money.

He flicks his attention to every item offered inside the shops, he samples most of them, but has a fixed list of what to buy without straying from it. He calmly determines the purchase even when his curious gaze fleetingly ogles something that he can’t afford, and knows with absolute precision the amount that covers his basic needs. He tests them meticulously for faults, unpins every cork, samples them until the very motion of his hands becomes scented.

Halfway along their journey, Malik ceases voicelessly handing him the acquired items and expands Altair’s involvement by letting him in on some of the secrets of the items he’s buying. 

“Smell this,” he instructs while holding out under Altair’s nose two glass vials with gooey pastel-colored liquids shimmering inside, “Which do you like better?”

“They’re both pleasant,” he admits with a helpless shrug and can’t help but wonder whether Malik is honoring his pickiness by intentionally choosing milder ointments which his nose won’t disagree with.

“We can have them mixed then.”

While the merchant is levigating two different ointments to form a smooth, uniform paste, Malik spends the holdup by perusing the random ware displayed at the shop’s outside stall. His gaze flits around and across until it sprouts roots on a particular item, a piece of pottery. A kylix, painted with a gilded lines depicting the myth, smooth to the touch and elegantly black, with a soapy feel to its polished surface. It’s a pricey-scented piece, probably serving an ablutionary or decorative purpose. For a fleeting moment it looks to Altair as if Malik’s frugal practicality gives way to a rare craving for self-indulgence as he dips a finger to brush along the smooth curve of the kylix’s outer rim with a look of fondness.

“It’s beautiful,” Malik says in a small voice, with his eyes still half-dressed in awe, an admiring smile frozen at the right corner of his lips rounding his right cheek into a gleaming cupola.

Altair is on the cusp of reaching for the bag of coins dangling at his hip to buy the kylix when Malik receives the ointment concoction from the merchant and heads right out, past Altair, leaving him somewhat baffled.

“You won’t buy?” he calls after Malik, already nostalgic about the wistful softness he had spotted in Malik’s eyes only moments before. 

Malik turns to look at him, then at the kylix Altair’s pointing at, eyes blinking, the haze of utter puzzlement pasted plainly across his face as if Altair’s very suggestion has left him mystified.

“No. It’s pricy. Let’s go,” he orders, expecting Altair to follow after him, but when the man doesn’t budge from the spot Malik shuffles over to nip at the hem of his sleeve and jolt him out of place.

“I’ll take the kylix,” Altair pronounces to the bemused merchant as soon as Malik turns his back to them. 

“Wha—Altair!? _No_ ,” Malik barks at him while swinging around, then blocks the merchant’s upturned hand awaiting Altair’s coin with his own before the man can sell it.

“Why not? You’re fond of it.”

 Malik flings an indignant huff at him, clearly offended by the question, and looks as if he’d be fond of striking Altair across the forehead if that would make him understand.

“Because I consider the price and whether its cost outweighs its purpose. You’ve no talent for this, you’re just throwing coins around as if someone’s begging you to.”

“It’s my money.”

“Actually, it’s not. You said your money belongs to me now,” Malik warns, his imperishable anger barely kept at bay.

Altair feels trapped.

“I want you to have it,” he insists, reaching to produce the amount glaring from the price-tag from the bag of his coins which has, up until now, admitted itself to Malik’s will in its entirety. With the debt owed to him by Abbas and the remaining war spoils at home, Altair imagines that there’s no reason to eke out the remaining coin since he’s brought the whole bag of it for Malik’s spending.

Malik shuts his eyes while the money exchanges hands, lets his blocking, now useless arm fall limp, and rolls his shoulders down in time with his exasperated sigh.

“I feel like I’ll regret this…” he mutters with thinning patience as Altair accepts the kylix from the beaming merchant.

“Can’t I have an opinion too?” Altair jests, altogether too unaware of how bone-deep Malik’s anger has spread in so quick a time.

Goaded beyond endurance, Malik suddenly bursts.

“I don’t give _a_ _fuck_ about your opinion. First build a home from scratch, and then have an opinion,” he sneers with a vehemence that, for a second, almost makes a real god of him.

He stomps off babyishly.

Altair is abandoned there like a man who merits pity.

He stands mired like a fly in honey, feeling his blood and flesh turn into something dead for an instant, until the moment of death dissolves and he feels, for the first time, like sobbing his heart out in the midst of a dumbfounded crowd.

The chasm that a single well-meant but ignorant gesture could dig between them makes him feel ill. He wriggles out of his stupor by the time Malik has stomped his way through the arc of the corridor, and starts after him, kylix in hand.

To his dismay, Malik doesn’t swerve off in the direction of the exit-entrance tunnel but trudges on, towards the blocked corridor that hosts Rauf’s forgery and, then, as if suddenly aware that it’s still guarded by the mercenaries, he branches off right to the sparring ring. The crowd is dense and Altair needs a few more moments of eternity to catch up with him.

Dour, Altair draws nearer, willing to stick his neck out just to ax their quarrel, but stops short of Malik when he catches him standing stiff with his breaths agitated—not from the fuming stampede but from emotion—the habitual dark-hued beauty of his eyes set off, or made prettier, by the creases of his glare.

Altair’s mouth rumples into a weird little smile.

What he’d failed to realize before is what he holds as true now: he’s kept dismissing his past glitches with Malik as bad luck or something else’s fault, but, oftentimes, it seems that assuming what will make Malik happy is less helpful than letting Malik do what he wants to do. Malik doesn’t like the reins being tugged from his grip.

And Malik clearly doesn’t want the kylix that Altair holds both-handed and forlorn.

At a loss, he drops his gaze to stare at the golden glint of pictures painted along the glossy blackness of its concave insides. A sequence of six miniatures depicts the story of the first time that [Nokem ](http://the-king-of-novices.tumblr.com/post/104486337526/live-forever-or-die-trying-the-pantheon-110)and [Gdila](http://the-king-of-novices.tumblr.com/post/104486350666/live-forever-or-die-trying-the-pantheon-210) met each other. Not as two gods, but as god and human.

The first miniature paints Gdila, a lover of glory, most courageous, most zealous for honoring danger, but fattened by Sheker’s evil tales about Nokem. On the next, seduced by these lies, he is smiting the god’s human children on his hunt for Nokem himself. He finds the god then: a dark, imposing creature with onyx skin and golden arms—the only glimmer of light on his body, save his gold eyes—and wastes no time attacking the god.

He is no match for Nokem.

Before his sword can touch the god, Nokem has already flung his spear and pierced the winged human’s heart, pinning him to ground. He wants the human dead, it’s not possible for a god to bear his hubris and overweening pride, nor the sin of killing his children. The next miniature shows Nokem approaching to draw his spear from Gdila’s pierced flesh and spotting the scarlet dragon inked into the human’s skin—the mark of deception, the seduction of Sheker’s sweet tongue—and it seems to him that the human does not see it, that the inner citadel of his self-esteem has never been punctured by the wounds of truth. Arguably the most beautiful painting depicts Nokem showing mercy and a dying Gdila opening up to truth after their prolonged quarrel, and Nokem swapping his golden eyes for the human’s dark ones to lend him his sight.

The dainty runes winding round the kylix’s center read: _If your sight fails you, I shall be your eyes_.

Nokem’s famous words before the final painting shows him giving his last golden self to Gdila as he heals the human’s pierced heart and the warmth of his compassion melts the gold off his arms, sealing the gaping wound that his spear has left on Gdila’s body.

On that spot, below his shoulder and above the heart, a golden scar remained as the memory of their first encounter where they shared oaths of loyalty.

On that same spot where Altair now feels the fist of pain squeezing around his heart when Malik, having sensed his presence, finally chooses to look over his shoulder with a face that’s succumbed to remorse.

“I’m sorry… I shouldn’t have—…” Malik starts with belated regret and trips over his own apology.

In an instant something splits open in Altair’s chest, momentarily freezes still in surprise, and slams shut. Then again everything becomes easy and limpid, and the sensation of something painful poking him between the ribs morphs into relief.

“I can return it if you don’t like it,” he lifts the kylix for emphasis, having concluded that the mood its purchase has poked into Malik hasn’t been worth the gesture.

“It’s not that I don’t like it. It’s only… it’s a luxury. We’ll need that money.”

“I’ll get that money.”

“How? You don’t even have a job.”

“I’ll find one.”

Malik looks away and returns to, or only now starts, watching the sword fight raging inside the spar ring. Altair shuffles up to his side, transfers the kylix into his left hand to balance it against his hip, and, without attempting to gauge Malik’s mood before making his move, he envelops him into his warmth with a side embrace, settles his hand around Malik’s waist and gently adjusts his belt as a flimsy excuse to pull him closer. Malik accepts the unruffled sugariness of his gesture without taking his eyes off the spar.

As soon as he feels the dry warmth of Altair’s long fingers crawl through the tunic, the tenseness of his shoulders smoothes itself out and Malik catches his anger falling asleep with Altair’s gentleness wrapped around him.

They watch the sword match as a pair.

“Hey?” Altair remembers as the fight trots slowly across the center of the pit towards them.

“Hm?”

“Wanna spar sometime?”

Malik’s reaction is what Altair expects, but also not. He looks up and turns his large smile at him. It’s the first time in days that Malik has smiled at him at all and the first time ever that Malik has smiled at him in such a manner, with such abandon and sincerity. They share a look and grin at each other like children who have agreed on something for once.

Altair soaks up that smile like something ephemeral and precious, until he grows so drunk on it that he nearly misses that the mercenaries have uncorked their blockade of the corridor.

 

* * *

 

 

As it turns out, where Rauf works is also where Rauf lives.

The backroom he and Desmond had seen him emerge from last time is where he keeps whatever personal belongings he owes, and its interior is exactly as Malik has described to him, though he chooses to deflate his jealousy by reminding himself that Rauf takes no lovers and doesn’t ponder on how Malik knows these particulars. It’s the compromise he’s made for having Malik agree to stay put and wait for him at the fighting pit.

The room is windowless and solid, unlit, with stray grains of sand crunching beneath the soles of his boots during his search for a certain wooden chest. Grinding his teeth is proving to be a decent enough distraction from mirages of Malik having touched the same clothes that he is currently stuffing into an empty satchel. Without a fire to borrow, he has seized a hanging lamplight from one of the neighboring shops with the intention of restoring it unseen. 

He combs through the chest swiftly, choosing clothes whose looks correspond best to the descriptions he has committed to memory. Rauf’s clothes are beautifully-tailored but their color is bland. He wears gray. A cold color for a warm man.

Halfway convinced that he’d stumble upon trouble during his retreat, Altair is relieved to find the corridor innocent of any mercenaries and concludes that they are sending search and patrol parties periodically. The wind of freedom gusts violently through it, reuniting the storeowners with customers. A few merchants are peeking from their shops, gladdened that the mercenaries have lifted the blockade. They’re losing customers.

The dumbfounded stare of the blacksmith whose lamp he had borrowed without his blessing follows Altair all the way down the burgeoning corridor after he hooks it back in place in front of him.

Then a hitch occurs. A moment away from his join into the stream of crowd circling the statue, Altair rediscovers the dim little ornament shop that sells feathers and momentarily forgets that he’s not supposed to spend money on Malik without Malik’s permission.

 

* * *

 

 

Malik has sensed that something extraordinary is about to happen.

It’s not that he craves spectacle, an open fight with mercenaries or harm to his husband, it’s that a premonitory chill passes down each side of his frozen spine when his avid, sharp-eyed gaze falls on a particular grain in the sand of people circling the statue.

It all begins very simply. The girl walks into the orbiting stream of bodies, the haze of her glossy hair, the color of apricot jam, showing from beneath her hood as she starts whirling her gaze about the market, her body hidden by cloak, her face pale and bewildered. And it’s not the fear that pours itself into every movement of her body that gives Malik a chill, but the bracelet peeking loosely from beneath her wide sleeve as she heads for the corridor where Altair had disappeared off to.

Warrior-makers. A whole dozen of them, more, enough to string a thick bracelet around a woman’s wrist.

Over the course of his life, Malik has seen a small handful of warrior-makers—all on his mother’s necklace, and one of his own that’s been gifted to him by a warrior he never met.

It would not be conceivable for a single person to possess this many warrior-makers, never, unless they were a seer.

Warrior-makers, those precious, custom-crafted corner-aligned golden coins, received only once, invaluable, a warrior’s most prized possession that marks their initiation into warrior ranks. A bequest that they are obliged to keep forever and gift only in exchange for something that they want most in life.

Only seers have been seen carrying such an extensive collection of warrior-makers, and this girl must be one of them, one of the kind that’s rarer than surviving nobles. A seer. In the midst of a bustling market.

Malik is cutting his attention into three pieces, one scouring for mercenaries, one watching Altair’s back and one following the girl who looks as if she, too, has been waiting for the mercenaries to vanish in order to slip into the blocked corridor.

Before he’s aware of what he’s doing or where he’s heading, Malik darts off through the mass, after her, follows the beckoning jingle of her bracelet with a yelling voice dead inside his throat and a swollen desperation throbbing inside his ribcage, and there’s one question on his mind as he rams shoulders with barriers before him and chases after the black flutter of her cloak. One question. The only one that Nokem ever asked the god of prophecy. The only one Malik ever dreams of.

_Will I defeat my enemy?_

_Will I defeat my enemy!?_

His question hits a silence.  The yell inside him swells. His feet carry him after her. She vanishes into a shop. Almost collides with a departing figure. Disappears into a void. The figure blocks his path.

And it speaks:

“Malik?”

He looks up and sees Altair and sees nothing. Nothing but jingly metal and a fluttery black, and a black flutter and metallic jingle.

“Where were you heading?”

Malik stares up blankly and says, “Nowhere.”

“Been worried about me?”

Before he can come up with something to say, anything to say, Altair lifts his hand, and in it he holds three pairs of handsome, curiously small feathers. Gifts.

Malik blinks at them, blinks up at Altair, sees him, it seems, for the first time, _truly_ this time, and the amber warmth of Altair’s eyes teases the phantom of a girl out of his sight, until the jingle and the flutter seem like they’ve come from some deep-buried hole of his mind, from a lost dream.

 

* * *

 

 

“I assume there won’t be a way out of forging weapons for Al Mualim this time,” Rauf ruminates aloud while folding his best clothes out on the sofa he has called bed for the past week as Malik is setting the table for dinner.  Though Malik is devoted to silence most times, he doesn’t seem to mind Rauf’s tireless chitchat. Rauf is an acquired taste. A man who owns a mobile face with a changing expression, and very talkative, with a fondness for talking when other people are working.

“Are you certain you could even lift a hammer in your current shape?”

“I’m as good as new,” he beams while accepting his dinner plate from Malik’s hand and is half right, since mobility has been miraculously reinstated to his arms and shoulders, despite the tender state of his many scars. A feat that Rauf blames on [Hiba](http://the-king-of-novices.tumblr.com/post/105028879746/live-forever-or-die-trying-the-pantheon-310)’s interference and patronage.

“With all that work I’ll hardly have time to teach sword fighting to children,” Rauf says between spoonfuls and turns a large smile on Altair. Altair, feeling that he’s been in no way invited to or appreciated in the conversation, responds with chewing and silence.

“Maybe Altair can help me out,” Rauf adds after his suggestive pause doesn’t take any bait.

Altair looks up at him, stares fiercely, can’t squeeze a word past the mouthful of food, and doesn’t budge until Malik nudges him from the stunned silence by brushing a cold, warm touch over the strained sinew in Altair’s naked neck.

“He’s offering you a job,“ Malik translates in a hushed whisper that can’t and doesn’t attempt to hide itself from Rauf.

“I’d be honored to take up that offer,” he utters out at last.

“Good,” Rauf beams and Altair wonders how the man can be so agreeable when he’s been so cross with him all this time, when their interaction has amounted to nothing more than glares, passive scuffle, mocking smiles, and competition for Malik’s attention.

 

* * *

 

 

It’s hours later when Malik finds homes for Altair’s gifts alongside his other feathers, arranges his expanded collection neatly inside the kylix, fixes the kylix inside [Nokem](http://the-king-of-novices.tumblr.com/post/104486337526/live-forever-or-die-trying-the-pantheon-110)’s stony lap, grooms himself for a prayer.

Slouched on bed, Altair watches him pray before the statue, and he will always watch him, as long as there is something to watch.

The whisper of his prayer is deep, but he doesn’t seem enthralled with it, the prayer is not hearty and soon falls into a bit of an actorly flourish, it’s dying to get away. Malik senses this, too, and Altair hears him apologizing to Nokem.  He blames it on a long day.  Assuming that the mention of Malik’s weakened religious passion would offend him, or worse hurt him, Altair decides to walk the conversation elsewhere.

“Are you happy? That I’ll have a job?” he asks when Malik joins him on the bed after the modest prayer.

“It’ll give you something to do. And it’s better than bending your knees to Al Mualim,” Malik adds, almost as an afterthought.

“Strange, how you’re not nearly as bothered by _Rauf_ working for Al Mualim.” As soon as Altair utters this, he knows he shouldn’t have spilled his thoughts without putting up a fight against the impulse. Not for any regret that the thought itself might provoke in him, but for the reaction it will inevitably stir in Malik.

“He is forced into it,” Malik insists, a notorious glare already wrinkling his brows.

“He wasn’t forced _before_ …” Altair mutters under his breath and can’t hide his own souring mood. Expecting an abscess of thoughtless anger to burst from Malik’s mouth, Altair finds the ensuing silence odd at best and distressing at worst. For the first time, Malik appears quietly honest about not having an appropriate response, and his honesty is enough to please Altair’s humble expectations. It seems to him that Malik is giving his words a decent thought, though without improving his overall ill opinion of Altair’s past by any measure.

In obedience that they’d once pledged to Al Mualim, they are equals: Rauf had been the sword and Altair the hand that had held it.

Altair suspects that Malik’s dissatisfaction runs deeper, however, and in this suspicion he’s not incorrect. Something tells him that the issue of obedience isn’t of utmost pertinence to Malik. That his bygone ties to Al Mualim are the lesser of two past evils, that the worst is the one which Altair can no longer correct: abandonment.

It both unsettles and reassures him that he is able to resist some innate instinct to reach out and shake Malik’s thoughts off by the shoulder, because he relies on this restraint to not renege the promise he’s made to himself to never cross Malik’s side of the bed again. At least not on his own volition, not uninvited. Self-discipline is a fresh behavior and demands cutting his old ties to doing how he best pleases.

At a second glance, Malik doesn’t look as bothered by these thoughts as Altair.

He looks as if he might doze off like that, with his back bonelessly flattened to the mattress and his nape lolled deep within a depression in the pillow. The manner in which his loosely-curled fists rest atop the center of his belly doesn’t suggest to Altair that he’ll be offered a hand anytime soon. Beyond being propped onto an elbow and slanting forward in a farce of feeling closer to Malik, Altair can’t do much else, his inventiveness is limited with this lack of consent on Malik’s part, and the prospect of reaching for Malik’s hand looks almost terrifying.

“It’s cold tonight,” Malik announces, as though to his own folded hands.

It’s a lie and a truth. While the nights _have_ become increasingly colder, the heat of their crackling fireplace always joins with the cool home into a warm marriage, leaving their bedroom in a state of hospitable and cozy warmth until early hours, when the fire simmers down to embers sluggishly enough.

First and foremost though, it’s a lie. Modest as he is in evaluating his chances, Altair believes that, with some stratagem unknown to him, Malik has just found a way to issue a not-so-subtle invitation.

Altair likes to think of himself as a man of principle. A man who refuses to promise himself to never cross a border, only to renege after the first flirt thrown his way. Keeping up principles requires a great deal of battling with himself. But once his mind is made up, he refuses to budge.

Malik peeks at him askance, fleetingly, piercing through the battle inside Altair like a spear.

This glance, actually, saves him.

He realizes that the only action required for him is inaction, and Malik would come over on his own—so impatient is his look, so convincing the aspiration of his body. And after a prolonged silence of no movement, Malik launches into a scoot, a slow and laborious slide across the mattress, until Altair’s propped head is looming over him and his own is sunk into a new pillow.

The irony is that the need which drives Malik to this behavior is the one he will later deny, more so if Altair is the one to bring it up, and it’ll remain impossible to get that proverbial mirror bent close enough toward Malik’s face for him to recognize what he is doing.

“What do you need?” Altair utters the question and it sounds like a spell and feels like an incantation, a prayer before sacrifice.

“A… kiss.”

The silence doesn’t taste the same this time.

To Malik it tastes of anticipation, wetted lips, a shuddery breath drawn between parted teeth. To Altair, of power he is given and the roar of craving glinting in Malik’s eye—the fruit of Malik’s stifled desire for exploration.

The one who moves next is only Altair, to straddle his unemployed elbow against Malik’s other shoulder and fix him in place, loom completely over him, to lean down, and not move past that.

“Do the rest,” he breathes against wetted lips awaiting his touch in order to tease out a response, cracks Malik’s hesitance with this cheap bait, destroying it—an old, proven method.

Malik lunges up to grab hold of Altair’s nape, sweeps through remaining distance by jolting off the pillow, as if stabbed by need to fill the void between his own parted lips. Malik’s rise is short-lived, immediately reversed by Altair’s descent as he bears down onto and _into_ the kiss, chaining the back of Malik’s head to the pillow to push him deeper into the cushion.

That’s the extent of Altair’s orchestration. He can’t do more with Malik’s constricting fingers wired against his nape and Malik’s tongue asking for room inside his mouth, and it’s well beyond Altair to attempt wrestling the lead now when Malik has captured him in a kiss so powerful, so _tight_ that the ghost of it will last for hours after they separate.

The plain fact is that Malik has acquired an appetite for kissing.

It must be so, because Malik’s kiss is wholesome and generous. Wholesome because Malik is enjoying it like a last supper. Generous by coincidence, because it hasn’t been intended as egalitarian, but Malik is giving as much as he is taking. It’s all clear to Altair whenever he parts his lips more to allow Malik deeper and something akin to a moan fills his mouth. Or Malik’s breath thins as his kiss turns longer, or something whimper-like laces through his moan when he lifts his knees up to squeeze Altair’s thick waist tightly.

He could limit himself to only kissing Altair, but it seems like a rather pedestrian goal with so much skin available to him. Almost as if he has no choice but to expand his power elsewhere on Altair’s body, which he feels eminently qualified to do as a husband. A hand instinctively skids down to where Altair’s muscles are thickest, where the palm will be filled fullest through the fabric of the shirt.

The moan that comes with this grope is Altair’s cue to add more daring into his own touch, but aware that he is still learning to read Malik properly, he breaks the lip-lock upon realizing that Malik is oblivious to what his hands are doing.

“Your hands always wander off when you’re kissed…“ Altair teases throatily, wrecked by the stretch of dilated pupils duskening the dark warmth of Malik’s irises.

Malik stalls then, caught between embarrassment and confusion at his own shenanigans.

“I didn’t say I don’t enjoy it,“ Altair appends to reassure him.

They lie motionless like this for a moment.

“You want more than this?” Altair prods on, pressing the frozen hand that’s listening to his heartbeat deeper against his chest, half-convinced that he’ll have to push Malik’s goodwill to the limits to encourage him.

“Yes…”

“Tell me what you want.”

“I—… to touch…”

“Here?” Altair solders his hand round Malik’s trapped fingers, clenching them tighter into the hardness of his pectoral muscle and savoring the mirrored squeeze that it immediately triggers around his right pec.

The squeeze comes with a shuddery breath and the smallest nod as its company.

“Where else?”

Guided by rekindled arousal, Malik’s left hand drops sharply to the center of Altair’s ripped belly, before he responds with a lovely, deep, dark , “Here.”

Altair rids himself of the nightshirt with haste and choking eagerness which he might repent at leisure.

Though he continues to lead Malik’s endeavor onwards to carefully stuff the holes of his attention with touches, Malik’s gaze starts slanting off soon after his hands grow grabby and importunate with Altair’s body, and before long he’s not looking at Altair at all and is instead pressing his face away, as if to conceal it.

“You know you’re not hidden from my sight just because you rub your cheek into my pillow?”

“I can’t look you in the eye while I do this…” Malik trails off and thinks of the admiration that his eyes will host and Altair’s will surely notice, should he allow their gazes to meet.

“I’ll keep my eyes closed then. For your comfort.“ 

After Malik makes no move nor effort to examine whether Altair has already closed his eyes, Altair flips them over to have Malik sit snuggly in his lap. After several shifts, they rapidly establish a pecking order, a ranked hierarchy: Malik is there to explore and Altair to sit still and be subjected to scrutiny and pleasure. To hold himself voluntarily blindfolded by keeping his eyes closed, to make Malik learn to trust him.

Altair is keen on touching in return, but for this he would have to fight Malik’s temper. Fighting is costly behavior. It requires energy and entails serious risk of injuring Malik’s trust, and Altair can’t profitably challenge him. Cheating is not an option when the reward is unattractive.

Expecting a continuation of earlier groping, he’s taken aback when Malik joins their lips into a kiss instead—an appetizer to whet Malik’s enthusiasm for the undertaking. The kiss he is given is so full, so detailed and compelling, so slick that the wet sound of their mouths coming together floods the room and sticks around like sugary dates on his tongue even after Malik pulls away.

It’s an odd feeling, having the tables turned and Malik being the one who is pleasure-wise disenfranchised.

Malik holds his breath and slows his mind to fully process that he is sitting in Altair’s lap and that this is what he’s longed to do almost from the start. He feels this evolutionary realization relax his inhibitions and heighten the deep-seated craving that’s otherwise had dim prospects during his secretive glances and guarded admirations of his husband’s body. He’s realized early enough that he wants to admire it in peace, undisturbed by Altair’s knowing vigil.

Now, here, he can notice all the small things that he’d managed to miss.

How gentle the tickle of hairs is against his palm when he combs across Altair’s nape. How the rutted surface of scars stands out to compete for his palm’s attention when he pets Altair’s skin blindly. How the candlelight hits his joined eyelashes painting them a uniquely-tinted gold. How its glow makes his skin glisten in a manner that’s almost otherworldly. How his thumb takes pleasure in the scratch of Altair’s stubble when he traces the rugged jawline. How slick the inside of Altair’s parted lip is with Malik’s own saliva. How the calluses of Altair’s fingers feel smoother while they rest dormant against the small of his back, softened under Malik’s watch and care. How diligently Altair keeps his eyes shut to earn his trust.

A pulse beats in his neck.

It feels like shyness would no longer suffice in trying to memorize Altair’s body and the grip of Malik’s hands swallows the hardness of his muscles faster than a greedy thought. A jaunty drag of hand down the plane of a warrior’s chest sends a shudder crawling up his lust-constricted throat. He drags a thumb across the bump of Altair’s collarbone, finding purchase beneath the ridge of the bone, in awe of how well-defined some of his muscles are, how big some parts of Altair are compared to his own. Altair answers the rough strokes of his hands with a tender rub up and down Malik’s clothed back, making his biceps bunch up and flex in a way that makes Malik’s heart jump, and Malik intuitively dives into the opportunity to fasten his hands to the widest, firmest part of the iron-hard muscle.

A swallow passes through his throat thickly and it sounds too loud to his own ears.

With breath bated, he holds there where Altair’s muscles are thickest, skewered by a crossbreed of arousal and admiration, and, seeing an uprising of goosebumps along Altair’s arms, he places his hands against the warmest patch of Altair’s chest to borrow from the heat and make the habitual iciness of his touch easier to endure, though he soon notices that these goosebumps aren’t the outcome of his coldness but something else.

Malik doesn’t want to dwell on it. He carries on, petting the goosebumps while hiding his own.

Altair has a body of hills and valleys and it keeps his hands ceaseless. It’s tendons strung fine like strings of a bow and sharp ravines plaid in-between bulging muscles like tartan and stray scars interrupting taut skin. The touching grows into a moment where Altair’s exhales become Malik’s inhales, warming him up, and this moment of warmth, this beautiful body is why, Malik is certain, a jealous hole cracks open in the ice around his heart and tells him to not allow Altair outside home because having others see this man in flesh would only inflame his jealousy. 

In a rare moment of unrestraint, Altair can’t keep his body chained enough to not arch his chest into the clench of Malik’s hands when the touching starts taking a peculiar shape. When an undercurrent of possessiveness in Malik’s grip can’t be concealed and his knees are no longer pressed up against Altair’s sides but drawn apart to allow fingers to caress the tapering cuts of his hips, when he attempts to cover every naked inch of skin like it’s his only chance.

There’s no shyness to Malik’s touch.

What had been a husband’s cute foibles has now become unguarded groping. Altair feels him everywhere. In the sweeping strokes, the weight that shifts around in his lap, the plumpness of his ass pressing down on his stiffening cock, the sheen of sweat that he leaves in the wake of his touch. Without dissecting all these sundry sensations, Altair allows his body to feel them all at once with none prevailing as dominant, and he realizes how much Malik’s face had distracted him from the nuances of being touched. He’d been focused so intensely on Malik that he’d forgotten to let his body soak up the pleasure of attention.

He’d allow Malik to devout as much time to his body as it takes to make him happy, even without pleasure involved in the equation.

On a second thought, Altair realizes that another one of his self-imposed expectations of making Malik happy by touching him has been unrealistic and itself a cause of poor decisions and unhappiness. Perversely, Altair feels happier now that he realizes he is not supposed to make Malik happy, that receiving attention is as good a way to achieve the happiness as bestowing attention upon him.

And Malik’s attention is unrivaled.

Where others would have shown lust alone Malik makes rapt admiration his main point; where another would have paired it with vulgarity he makes it artistry.

“Do you like it?” Altair inquires about his body, shut-eyed, trying to pull Malik from thoughts and possible regret after sensing a change in his pace.

“I find it most beautiful to the eye and pleasing to the touch,” Malik confesses without stymieing his slowing ministrations, stroking the fleshy knolls of his palms over the rounded curves of Altair’s pecs.

“I will keep its shape then. For your pleasure,” Altair promises and finds his voice hoarse, though he hasn’t done much besides sitting still.

It gives Malik pause. He halts there, with handfuls of Altair’s hard muscle and taut beautifully-blemished skin, and he recognizes with utter amazement that Altair is foolishly unaware of his own body, of how attractive it is or how it might affect the typical onlooker. He then stupidly realizes that Altair’s body isn’t the result of deliberate training to make it look so, but rather an inconsequential byproduct of preparing for warfare and year-round combat.

“My muscles aren’t this big,” Malik complains at the unfairness, struggling to enfold half the circumference of Altair’s bicep in his grip, much like Talia had struggled with his wrist, “My belly isn’t hard like this,” he laments while brushing a knuckle down the vaulted surface of Altair’s abdomen wistfully, “My chest isn’t like marble. I’m all slim and… plump,” he concludes with mild disrespect and this envy-specked self-depreciation gives his cheeks a nice flush which Altair’s blocked sight isn’t privy to.

What he doesn’t expect is the dreamful sigh that Altair heaves at the mention of Malik’s body.

“And it’s damn handsome…”

Malik grimaces indignantly, spiteful in advance of Altair’s reply to his next question, “What’s so handsome about it?”

“Everything,” Altair mouths with genuine admiration and without a stumble as he gathers Malik closer to feel him against his skin.

Malik remains tight-lipped and slack-jawed for a few moments. His mind wanders back and forth between Altair’s word and his sightless face, and the sensation that they cause in the core of his chest is a stranger to Malik and he hopes that it’s an accident.

“How can you love what’s so different from yourself?” Malik mumbles and treats the question as if its answer is something utterly unattainable. And he is _sure_ that Altair’s feelings aren’t a mirror of his own and how can they be when he regards Altair’s body with awe and jealousy and pride because he’s married to _that_ , and Altair can’t possibly feel the same.

“How can _you_?” Altair teases, with the hint of a droll smirk thinning his otherwise solemn expression.

“Back when I first saw a reflection of my loyalty in you, I thought I was looking at my own reflection. That’s why I chose you,” Altair continues with a stab of inspiration, bent on explaining something that Malik feels the man hasn’t shared before and that somehow belongs to _Malik_ , “I’ve learned, since then, that… to love ‘the perfect match’ is to love yourself in the other, because you already defined the other through yourself. I… I recognized that this love is vain, and conceited, since it searches for oneself in the other. But once I realized that you are not what I’d imagined, I understood that true courage resides in the love which embraces the radical _otherness_ of the other. I love you _because_ you’re diff—“

It’s here where Malik fills his palm with the rest of Altair’s sentence and seals the man’s mouth with an urgent press—not cruel enough to deny his lungs breath, nor firm enough to prevent Altair’s lips from pushing a kiss into the blocking hand in silent response.

In the moments that follow, Malik sits deafened and woozy, and stares at the portion of Altair’s calm face which his hand hasn’t managed to hide. The suaveness of Altair’s uncensored thoughts and the ease with which he’s articulated something so complex has struck him particularly agonizing, unbearable to the point of suffocation.

As though he has just caught a glimpse of what it feels like to be loved by Altair.

Altair could have released him from the bond of their marriage after realizing that his love is and will continue to remain one-sided. He could have said “I’m not interested in this kind of love. If that’s love, you can have it.” But, gods, Altair is lonely for him. Is _pining_ for him. Malik’s never known what this word meant before, until he’s seen it happening to this man. Altair misses him fiercely. Just longs for his company. He is pining for him like Malik is pining for revenge. More, perhaps.

When he at last removes the seal off Altair’s mouth, Altair doesn’t need to open his eyes to feel that the length of Malik’s forearms hasn’t remained immune to gooseflesh. He feels its rash below Malik’s wrist as the cold hand passes his jawline on its way to the back of his neck, as it clutches a handful of hair, just above his nape.

Malik’s hand has missed the feeling of petting something and he’s honest about it.

Altair indulges in the pleasant scratch of nails on his neck and Malik in the scratch of stubble prickling the cup of his palm, until he’s no longer petting Altair but Altair is petting Malik’s hand with his face. Altair’s eyes are obediently closed and Malik responds to this wordless request for affection with a heartfelt brush of thumbs over the soft skin behind his ear, and for once it’s a completely sentimental spectacle, sufficiently mutual that Malik can’t acknowledge it as a mere return of favors, or a reward.

Altair asks for little.

Altair asks for much.

 _Loving_ someone is a grimmer prospect than being loved. Malik can almost make out the shape of this feeling across the brink that he doesn’t intend to cross—because he doesn’t want to and because he’s convinced himself that he hasn’t yet thought hard enough about giving _loving_ a chance, though he knows that one doesn’t start loving after _thinking_ about it.

Altair’s words keep on rattling in the back of his head. His stomach feels full and nervous.

He cradles up the side of Altair’s face in his palm, warmed by borrowed heat of Altair’s neck, and watches the corner of Altair’s mouth rise towards his cradled cheek. Then he harvests the result of his petting by bending to capture this half-smile with his lips.

He spends the rest of the silence listening to the warm pulse on Altair’s neck where he can feel the dutiful beating of his heart and watching him breathe.

He is yet full of words forged over the years of his enraged silence, but maddeningly wordless while fondling the swollen surface of a bluish vein on Altair’s neck with a certain warmth and tenderness. His vulnerable hands feel powerful when Altair’s powerful body is vulnerable beneath him. He might be holding onto Altair’s past mistakes as a crutch in order to blame him for abandonment, but beneath this outer layer, Malik knows that it’s not a question of whether he feels safe in Altair’s arms. It’s whether Altair is safe in Malik’s.

It’s always been this. Ever since Kadar.

And if he had succumbed to any thoughts of love only moments ago, Malik now feels them crunch under the hooves of his galloping memory of Kadar. It reminds him of what it means to be alive: to live is to love flesh that’s mortal. To hold it against his skin as if his life depends upon it. And when the time comes, to let it go.

To let it go.

 

 

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> And in other news, Rauf is asexual and Altair punched the lad for nothing…
> 
> I just feel like saying this in case someone doesn’t get Malik: Malik’s at this point in life where he’d rather let go of what he’s never had (Altair) than have it torn from his grip by death. Because he’s so hung up on not having been able to protect his brother. Seething with revenge is easier than admitting that he does want to love someone but is afraid of losing them.


End file.
